Make it make sense

Journalists are in the sense-making business. But the job is harder when things become more unpredictable and inexplicable. On both fronts, President Trump creates journalistic pitfalls on a daily basis.

A number of media thinkers have weighed in recently on this phenomenon, examining journalists’ story decisions, framing and word choices. Here are three takes from recent days:

Words and phrases we can do without (The Contrarian): Jennifer Rubin cautions against using the phrase “Trump is testing the limits…”, saying it “conjures up a vision of deliberate inquiry” when his actions are anything but.

How to wrest the news agenda back from Trump (Second Rough Draft): Dick Tofel suggests several strategies for regaining “the essential editorial role of informing readers, listeners and viewers” about what’s really significant, including “knowing wheat from chaff.”

Why U.S. reporters won’t call Trump an authoritarian (By Glenn Kessler): The former Washington Post fact-checker, who’s started a newsletter on Substack, says journalists are still defaulting to “euphemism and restraint.”

News In Focus
Headlines, resources and events aligned with API’s four areas of focus.

Civic Discourse & Democracy

>> New from API: Five environments where generational solidarity is needed — and how local journalism can help

At our local API Local News Summit this summer in Denver, we tackled the question of how news organizations can facilitate civic discourse across generations. We asked five participants to share the strategies they have used to engage and serve multigenerational audiences.

>> Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear goes national with podcast, the hot format for aspiring politicians  (Associated Press)  

SiriusXM is giving the Democratic governor’s new podcast a national platform starting this month, David Bauder reports, an example of politicians using personal podcasts to raise their profiles.

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Culture & Inclusion

>> Half the world, only a quarter of the news: Women appear or are heard in just 26 per cent of all broadcast, radio and print clips (UN Women)

The latest edition of the Global Media Monitoring Project finds that women account for just 26 per cent of news subjects and sources. It said that number had barely changed in the last 15 years.

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Community Engagement & Trust

>> Local news needs a weather beat before the next disaster hits (Poynter) 

Weather has a big story to tell, writes journalist Jan Wesner Childs, and a full-time weather beat reporter in local newsrooms can “connect the dots” and help keep people safe.

>> Too many Americans are losing faith in the role of journalists (The Seattle Times)

Brier Dudley dissects a recent Pew Research Center report on Americans’ views of the news. “Are people so fatigued by awful national and global news, they don’t care anymore?” he writes.

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Revenue & Resilience

>> Semafor takes aim at Davos as events surpass 50% of revenue (Adweek)

Semafor has made four senior hires as part of a move to build out its events business, writes Mark Stenberg. Cofounder and chief executive Justin Smith said events are a “core” business for Semafor.

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What else you need to know

💸 Paramount in talks to buy Bari Weiss’ Free Press for up to $200M, give her senior editorial role at CBS News (New York Post)

🔍 The biggest antitrust case against Big Tech in decades turned out to be kind of a flop (Nieman Lab)

💔 Local journalists and fixers are dying at unprecedented rates in Gaza. Can anyone protect them? (The Conversation)

🤖 ‘Flipping the script’ and other tell-tale signs of AI-written copy (Press Gazette)

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Weekend reads

+ ‘The Paper’ review: I have good news and I have bad news (The New York Times)

+ Humans are being hired to make AI slop look less sloppy (NBC News)

+ How to survive the (media) apocalypse (CJR)

+ Why more and more people are tuning the news out: ‘Now I don’t have that anxiety’ (The Guardian)