The Lying Mouth Slays the Soul

Lying is the force that is most diametrically opposed to journalism. So why has it been so hard for journalists to combat it?  Earlier this month, Brian was asked to deliver a treatise on this question to an audience of journalists, and writing it took him in a bunch of directions he didn’t expect…

A Republican Takes On Her Party Over Voter Data

Voting in this year’s midterms is already underway. And for the past year leading up to this election, the Trump administration has been pushing to get its hands on every state’s unredacted voter rolls, saying it wants to check for noncitizens who are illegally registered.  Those rolls include per…

The A.I. Populist

Midterm elections are around the corner, and AI is obviously an issue that’s getting a ton of attention from candidates. There are so many thorny questions around this technology, but what do politicians intend to do about it?  Today, we are sharing an interview with Texas Congressman Greg Casar fr…

The High Stakes Game of Bargaining with the News

Just a few weeks ago, David Ellison and Paramount were staring down the barrel of a $7 million dollar per day fine for every day their merger with Warner Bros was not finalized, with a 12 state class-action antitrust lawsuit standing in the way. The states, led by California attorney general Rob Bo…

Flock Won’t Answer This One Town’s Simple Question

Flock Safety’s license plate cameras are in about 6,000 towns across the U.S. But lately, towns have been pulling out of their contracts after all sorts of creepy stories about cops using the cameras to spy on people in their personal lives.  But in Tewksbury, Mass., residents have a different con…

Wait, Did Zuckerberg Get Off Easy?

A few weeks ago, Meta was in trouble. 47 states plus several U.S. territories were suing the company in federal court for knowingly harming kids with its apps, Instagram and Facebook. Several of the states were in the middle of a trial in California; damaging information was coming out about Meta; …

Introducing: Reaching Out

Today we’re excited to share a special episode of Reaching Out, a new podcast from Futuro and KCRW. Hailed by Ira Glass as the “best new show I’ve heard in years,” Reaching Out is a story about fathers, sons, and the distance between. The story begins on the eve of twin brothers’ Sayre and Connor’…

The Curious Case of the Fake Florida Newsroom

When Florida reporter Kate Payne stumbled across a local news site called The South Florida Standard, something about it felt off. She’d never heard of the outlet before and didn’t know any of the journalists who were listed on its staff, even though their bios touted long careers in Florida journa…

A Pitch for Why Journalists Need to Fight

What would it take to actually fix America’s broken journalism industry? Using rural North Carolina as a petri dish, the podcast Scene on Radio spent their latest season, called “The News”, diagnosing how American journalism is failing the public: collapsing local newsrooms, corporate consolidation…

Badass Local Journalists on How to Fight Corruption

Local reporters from around the country tell stories of using the experiences of their neighbors to confront people in power. Guests: Anna Wolfe with Mississippi Today Lisa Halverstadt with Voice of San Diego Alissa Zhu with The Baltimore Banner Tony Plohetski with The Austin American-Statesman a…