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Chad Polazzo's avatar

Wow! Well written. The issue with traditional print media and it's baby (TV) and grand baby (social media), is that it was dying. The Trump/Hillary matchup along with the nearly 50/50 split of the electorate proved to be akin to adding ten superbowls worth of revenue to an industry that was desperate to reinvent itself to stay alive and relevant. Mergers & acquisitions reduced the number of independent publications, and many 'redundancies' (read: trained reporters) were eliminated in favor of minimizing cost. Meanwhile, clicks and likes were the new profit source. And with our hectic American culture and the explosion of competing businesses looking for viewer/consumer/reader attention, the whole "if it bleeds, it leads" mantra went into overdrive.

The timing was perfect for Trump, who was trained in media 'reality' TV, to leverage these hungry media outlets by throwing them a soundbite that sold clicks. Headlines that stood out and that got people paying attention. Of course, the attention was mostly anger and outrage — by people who agreed with Trump and by people who did not. That engagement meant big bucks for newsrooms which had been previously relegated to the loss leader role in a media conglomerate. Now they were becoming profit centers. And the more Trump gave them, the more they ate it up. He was like an owner throwing his dogs a bone. This rambling method of marketing himself via shocking tweets, memes, lies, attacks, and outright violations of the law — is part of his media-weaving, circus ringleader personality that allows everyone to pick and choose what they want to say about him.

He's certainly a job creator in that respect. And the media companies know that if he goes away, so does their big payday. They already know that Harris is going more by the Obama/Biden playbook when it comes to engagement with the press. On an as-needed basis. They rightly fear that if she wins, we will be back to business as usual and their numbers will plummet.

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Charlie Taylor's avatar

I just gifted this article to a friend who is an editor for CBS news…

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