Notices by Dan Gillmor (dangillmor@mastodon.social), page 7

We always understood that Marc Benioff's mentor, Larry Ellison, is a sleazy right-winger.

But it comes as somewhat of a surprise -- and a sad one -- to learn that Benioff, who for years portrayed himself as a liberal, is just another Trumpist billionaire.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/10/us/marc-benioff-san-francisco-guard.html

The Trump Action Tracker is brilliant already, keeping track of the regime's bad acts. The UI could use a few improvement, and I'd urge several more categories (or emphasis of sub-categories), but I'm blown away now. https://www.trumpactiontracker.info

I now assume that the avalanche of "journalism" "covering" Amazon "deals" on "Prime Days" is almost entirely a revenue generator for the "news" organizations, via commission links.

I canceled Amazon Prime. Consider doing the same.

Trump, the Ellison family and their cynical -- but rich -- acolyte, Weiss, are spitting on the graves of Murrow and Cronkite. They're neutering the remaining honorable journalists.

CBS was never perfect. But it once stood for integrity. That's done.

It's CBS "News" now.
https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/free-press-founder-bari-weiss-named-editor-cbs-news-after-deal-with-paramount-2025-10-06/

RE: https://mastodon.social/@campuscodi/115321288232713778

Corporate PR becomes even more stupid.

The word "democracy" has been poisoned by people who love dictatorship. BIg Journalism poisoned its own well. We need to talk up "local/community news and information" if we want people to care about saving both.

https://www.niemanlab.org/2025/10/dont-dwell-on-democracy-and-other-new-findings-about-how-to-market-local-news/

"With five congressional seats at stake, virtually all of our national legacy media made the choice not to send anyone" to cover a hearing on whether what Texas did was illegal.

Democracy Docket is there, however. More evidence that we now have to rely on small outlets.

https://newsletters.democracydocket.com/legacy-media-skipped-this.-we-didnt

Trump is "exactly what George Washington feared could happen with an unscrupulous commander in chief," writes Tom Nichols in the Atlantic:

https://archive.ph/Tsfv3

Meanwhile, Big Journalism mostly treats paranoid menace as just another political story.

Cowardice at Apple: https://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/apple-takes-down-ice-tracking-app-after-pressure-from-ag-bondi

"Who goes Nazi?" -- everyone should read this classic from the great Dorothy Thompson.

https://harpers.org/archive/1941/08/who-goes-nazi/

This is how the New York Times pretends to do journalism -- treating the Trump/Hegseth fascist military event as just routine partisan politics.

The Times will go down in history as a quisling operation, and its bosses will be remembered for their cowardice.

Can local/state law enforcement do anything about criminal feds? At least one blue state is going to try, it seems. https://www.cbsnews.com/chicago/news/feds-fire-pepper-ball-at-cbs-chicago-reporters-truck/

If you know anyone in the U.S. military at any level, please make sure they see The Orders Project, "a non-partisan program created by the National Institute for Military Justice to assist military personnel in understanding their options when faced with orders they believe may not be legal."

https://www.nimj.org/top.html#/

Just like the other Big Media payoff "settlements" to Trump in his string of bogus lawsuits, Google's millions are proof that he is a successful extortionist -- and that they are willing to pay bribes. Don't think otherwise. https://www.cnn.com/2025/09/29/business/youtube-settle-trump-lawsuit

A rare bit of good news: right-wing media companies Nexstar and Sinclair decided the advertising money the Kimmel show spins off is more important than doing Dear Leader's bidding. This is a loss for Trump, at least for the moment.

https://apnews.com/article/jimmy-kimmel-sinclair-affiliates-40489e9058a609029ebcb2ef894221e9

From Teen Vogue, which is doing some of the best journalism about the extremist cult now in charge of the U.S. government:

https://www.teenvogue.com/story/men-dressed-as-ice-agents-to-assault-immigrant-women-horrifying-trend

We need to assume that every masked person kidnapping people off the street is a criminal, whether employed by the Trump regime or not.

ByteDance (TikTok owner) valuation is north of $300 billion. Trump "deal" to give it to his oligarch supporters is "valued" at $14 billion, says Vance.

So correct me if this is wrong: They're essentially nationalizing a foreign company and giving it to cronies who'll pay pennies on the dollar.

Peter Thiel is competing with Elon Musk for most evil tech lord, with a different strategy.

Musk is doing a lot of his foul work in plain sight. It seems that Thiel is trying to keep the public from understanding what he's doing until it's too late to stop him.

https://newrepublic.com/article/200471/peter-thiel-obsession-antichrist-religion?ref=theframelab.org

The once-peerless BBC has followed in the footsteps of American media by normalizing extremism. Now it's planning programming changes so that fascists will trust it more.

Downside is that people who want integrity from their media organizations will trust it not at all.

https://bylinetimes.com/2025/06/09/bbc-news-tim-davie-robbie-gibb-reform-voters-nigel-farage-trust/

South Korea president makes it clear that American trade extortion could trigger a financial meltdown in his country.

Occam's Razor suggests Trump and his billionaire backers want a global collapse. Wipe out 90% of people's assets, go bargain hunting -- and own it all.

https://www.reuters.com/world/china/south-koreas-president-lee-says-us-investment-demands-would-spark-financial-2025-09-21/