Notices by Flipboard (flipboard@flipboard.social)

This year, social media displaced TV and online news websites/apps as the top way Americans get news, according to Oxford’s Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism (RISJ). According to their latest Digital News Report, the change is happening all over the world, but "faster and with more impact" in the United States. Here's more detail and other findings from the research, courtesy of Nieman Lab.

https://flip.it/2s2ai2

#News #NewsIndustry #Media #Journalism #USNews

Remember when the web was fun? @cwebber does, and she reminded users of that in her keynote speech at last week's FediForum, in which she talked about how the fediverse can't succeed without joy. Here's @ricmac's writeup of the event, which included presentations from @_elena, @quillmatiq, @mike, @michael, @benpate and more.

https://flip.it/ft862s

#Fediverse #FediForum #ActivityPub #SocialMedia #OpenSocial

It’s Friday! It’s nearly June! How the heck did that happen?! Here’s our #NewstodonFriday selection of stories from independent newsrooms and a few that caught the Flipboard editorial team’s eye. And while there’s hard-hitting journalism in there (we live in hard-hitting times), there’s more than our usual number of inspiring, positive stories of hope and beauty amidst destruction and oppression. @timkmak’s team writes about secret apartment concerts in Ukraine. @TheConversationUS’s story is about “bone music” in Soviet Russia. We’ll end with a Tiny Desk concert from @npr to take you into the weekend. Please follow independent publishers on the open social web, engage with their stories, and donate money if you can. ⤵️

#Media #Journalism #News #Newstodon #MastodonMigration #FollowFriday

They may share a suffix (and a protocol), but Blacksky isn’t hitching its wagon to the Bluesky app or team. Founder and CEO @rudyfraser.com is creating a new, fiercely independent playbook for communities — one made possible because of the flexibility of the open web. We're excited for you to hear the latest episode of @mike's Dot Social podcast:

https://about.flipboard.com/fediverse/blacksky-rudy-fraser/

#DotSocial #Podcast #SocialMedia #SocialNetwork #Federation #OpenSocial #OpenSocialWeb #Blacksky #BlackMastodon @blackmastodon #RudyFraser #Technology #Tech #Bluesky

The Memorial Day weekend in the U.S. typically marks the start of summer there, so here’s a collection of light and frothy… just kidding! We’ve got stagflation! We’ve got a barnstormer from @Daojoan about the global loss of virtue and morality! We’ve got Dr. Phil’s son and his payday loans! In and amongst the hard news, find a little optimism with not one, but two stories on helping birds, a piece from @TexasObserver on how Jess Rizo, whose niece died in the Uvalde shooting, turned pain into a run for public office, and some inspiring stories on activism from @Joysauce. Don’t forget to follow independent publishers on the open social web, engage with their stories, and donate money if you can. ⤵️

#Media #Journalism #News #Newstodon #MastodonMigration #FollowFriday

Graphic novel legends Art Spiegelman and Joe Sacco collaborated on a three-page “comic” about Gaza earlier this year. @thetyee’s Tom Sandborn thought that might lead to controversy, but it didn’t. He looks at the art of the comic form — how it can provoke, satirize, and challenge moral complacency, and whether it’s journalism.

https://thetyee.ca/Culture/2025/05/22/Comics-Power-Moral-Horror-Spiegelman-Sacco-Gaza/

#Culture #Art #Comics #Journalism #Media #GraphicNovels #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

John J. Lennon lives at Sing Sing Correctional Facility, where he is serving his 24th year of a 28-years-to-life sentence. He’s also a journalist whose work has appeared in Esquire, the New York Times, the Atlantic, and more. Until last year, he was at Sullivan Correctional Facility, where he mentored emerging writers, both informally and most recently, through the Sullivan Nonfiction Writing Workshop. He writes for @nybooks about setting that up, and what happened when it came to an end with the prison’s closure. “I often think about the time before I came to prison, when I had no promising future. I’ve come to realize that two opposing realities can be true at once: prison probably saved my life and it’s where I learned to write; and prison is a disgusting place that’s hurting me more now than ever,” he writes. “I’m both ashamed and proud of my path. But it wouldn’t have been possible if prison officials hadn’t given writing programs a chance.” [Story may be paywalled]

https://www.nybooks.com/online/2025/05/21/finding-the-story-prison-writing/

#Writing #Journalism #AmWriting #Prison #Incarceration #JusticeSystem #Crime #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

Nine-year-old Jackie Cazare was one of the victims in the horrific Uvalde, Texas, shooting. In total, 19 children and two teachers were murdered. In the aftermath, Jackie’s uncle, Jess Rizo, became a regular at local government meetings. A year ago, he was elected to the Uvalde CISD school board. He spoke to @TexasObserver’s Gus Bova about turning anger to activism, what he’s learned, and how the community is coming back together. “Everybody, when you go to these meetings, you hear the word transparency, you hear the word accountability, and so everybody’s practicing what they’re preaching, and so we hold each other to that,” he says.

https://www.texasobserver.org/uvalde-jesse-rizo-school-board/

#Texas #TexasPolitics #Uvalde #SchoolShootings #Safety #School #Education#Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

We were hoping for the summer of love, or at the very least, the summer of ice cream and going to the beach, but alas, @damemagazine tells us, it’s the summer of stagflation. Kaz Weida explains the difference between this and a common-or-garden recession, the signs that indicate the U.S. is going in that direction, and lessons from the past about how to survive the squeeze.

https://www.damemagazine.com/2025/05/20/the-summer-of-stagflation-is-here/

#Stagflation #Inflation #Economics #Tariffs #USPolitics #USEconomy #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

Has any country changed in the past quarter-century as much as China? While it’s still a deeply unequal society, living standards across the board have improved dramatically. Filmmaker Jia Zhangke documents this transformation in his latest movie, “Caught by the Tides,” a blend of fiction and non-fiction shot over the past 20 years and starring his wife, Zhao Tao, as Qiaoqiao. “Qiaoqiao is not so much a character as an avatar for a searching generation, her presence both affecting and affected by her surroundings, a constant reminder that the things we lose define us as much as the things we gain,” writes Dennis Zhou for @nybooks.

https://www.nybooks.com/online/2025/05/13/the-quantum-generation-jia-zhangke/

#China #ChineseCulture #Cinema #Film #Movies #JiaZhangke #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

It must be exhausting, being Brian Harrison. The Republican representative for Ellis County in the Texas legislature is constantly outraged. ”About what, exactly, depends on the day,” says @TexasObserver’s Joelle DiPaolo. Here’s her story about how Harrison is just one in a long line of loud, dissenting hard-right legislators that aim to disrupt and change things — and that are turning off even the staunchest Republicans. “Harrison’s insatiable scorched-earth tactics and his holier-than-thou rhetoric have alienated his fellow House members to the point where valid criticisms remain unheard, or more often, ridiculed,” writes DiPaolo.

https://www.texasobserver.org/brian-harrison-texas-lege-self-righteous-crusade/

#Texas #TexasLegislature #Politics #TexasPolitics #BrianHarrison #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

Good morning/afternoon/evening/night to you, depending on where you are, and when you see this #NewstodonFriday thread! Here’s our weekly selection of stories from indie media outlets on everything from a holier-than-thou Texas legislator to an incredible scientific treatment that may have cured a little boy of a genetic illness. Plus, housing scams, Grok’s obsession with South Africa, and a word from The Boss. We love independent media, and we hope you’ll share these stories far and wide, comment (we’d love to see your recommendations for the best things you’ve read/watched/heard this week). And if you can afford to, please donate your money to these brilliant sites.⤵️

#Media #Journalism #News #Newstodon #MastodonMigration #FollowFriday

Good news from @npr, as shared by our @ScienceDesk. A baby born in Philadelphia last August with a life-threatening genetic disorder was successfully treated with a gene-editing infusion developed using CRISPR technology. His genetic defect appears to have been fixed, at least partially reversing his condition.

https://www.npr.org/sections/shots-health-news/2025/05/15/nx-s1-5389620/gene-editing-treatment-crispr-inherited

#Science #Medicine #GeneTherapy #CRISPR #GeneEditing #Genetics #Children #GoodNews #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

@bolts is the best magazine for keeping your eye on America’s local politics, and possibly detecting if a shift is happening (were we the only ones glued to the Omaha, NE mayoral elections earlier this week)? Alex Burness writes about judge elections in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, where a “slate of eight” progressive-endorsed candidates are running. Their supporters hope that the prospective judges, who come from public defender, social work and civil rights backgrounds, will have more understanding of the issues faced by criminal defendants. Check out the second list for @taniel’s list of elections to watch in May.

https://boltsmag.org/allegheny-county-judge-elections-2025/
https://boltsmag.org/whats-on-the-ballot/guide-to-elections-in-may-2025/

#Pennsylvania #Philadelphia #PrisonReform #Law #Elections #LocalElections #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

“Am I the last fat person in America?” asks @damemagazine’s Kate Bernyk. She writes about the rise of weight-loss drugs like Ozempic, the message that delivers to fat people — ”Your body is a mistake, and now there’s finally a way to fix it,” — and why she doesn’t want to take medication to change her size. “The idea of eliminating any kind of body should terrify us — not just because it’s wrong, but because it’s unimaginative,” she writes.

https://www.damemagazine.com/2025/05/15/am-i-the-last-fat-person-in-america/

#BodyImage #Weigh #WeightLoss #Medicine #Health #Ozempic #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

Ricardo Sandoval-Palos, public editor of PBS, joined @SFPublicPress executive director Lila LaHood at a recent fireside chat to discuss the future of media. The conversation took place before President Trump had announced an executive order attempting to defund public media, but Sandoval-Palos was anticipating the move. “The threat is at the local station level. The bulk of rural stations around the country, and even some urban stations probably cannot stay open if they don’t have the support from the [Corporation for Public Broadcasting] CPB. Some stations, up to 60% of their budgets are made up by funds from CPB,” he said.

https://www.sfpublicpress.org/responding-to-attacks-on-public-media-dei-and-democracy/

#Media #PublicMedia #PBS #NPR #TrumpAdministration #USPolitics #NewsIndustry #MediaIndustry #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

We all have subjects we know we talk about too much (sorry in advance for boring your ears off about politics/our new dog). In the case of X’s Grok AI, it’s white genocide. @404mediaco’s Matthew Gault writes about how, on the afternoon of May 14, Grok answered virtually every question it was asked, whether it was about baseball, video games or HBO, with a reference to South African politics and the widely debunked claims that Afrikaners there are victims of racism. “I think they're literally just taking whatever prompt people are sending to Grok and adding a bunch of text about ‘white genocide’ in South Africa in front of it,” said Matthew Guzdial, an AI researcher at the University of Alberta.

https://www.404media.co/why-did-grok-start-talking-about-white-genocide/

#Tech #Technology #AI #ElonMusk #SouthAfrica #Africa #WhiteGenocide #Grok #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

HomeVestors of America is a real-estate flipper known for its “We Buy Ugly Houses” advertisements. The business model: Independent franchisees buy up homes in need of a fast sale, renovate them, and sell them on at vast profit. It’s a win-win scenario — except when it isn’t. @ProPublica has run a series of stories on how home sellers are exploited by franchisees, which has led to the company making changes in its business practices. The latest article explores how one Texas franchisee exploited people who wanted to invest with him, in a Ponzi scheme that netted him millions and left them broke.

https://www.propublica.org/article/homevestors-fraud-charles-carrier-texas

#Money #Finance #HomeBuying #HomeInvestors #Texas #Dallas #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

Add another item to the long, long list of things that scare us about climate change. @KnowableMag’s Sanket Jain writes about how conditions like cataracts, pink eye and keratitis are linked to heat, pollution and UV exposure.

https://knowablemagazine.org/content/article/health-disease/2025/how-climate-change-threatens-eye-health

#Health #Medicine #EyeHealth #ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #Environment #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

On that note, some words from Bruce Springsteen, as shared by our @CultureDesk. "The last check on power after the checks and balances of government have failed, are the people, you and me," said the Boss at a show in Manchester, U.K. Here’s the video of his many anti-Trump remarks at the show.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ZHWIYHlXOs&t=1s

#BruceSpringsteen #TheBoss #Springsteen #TrumpAdministration #USPolitics #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday