“Let’s wait until after the election to run this.”
That was a New York Times editor, burying a story about riots in Kenosha. He was afraid the report could hurt Joe Biden.
It’s bias like that which led Bari Weiss to leave the Times and start her own site, The Free Press.
In a frank conversation at the All-In Summit, Weiss explains how the media became left-wing advocates and what she’s doing to get back to facts.
Mainstream Media Is Preaching to the Choir
Mainstream media used to make its money from advertising. Big advertisers like Procter & Gamble spent a fortune on ads. Even more poured in from the classifieds.
Today, advertising has moved online. The classifieds are dead, replaced by Craigslist.
This cost the media a fortune in revenue.
Papers like the Times and The Washington Post found a new model: charge readers. Both have major subscription businesses.
But when you rely on subscriptions, you have an incentive to tell readers what they want to hear. And for papers like the Times, the readers want to hear a left-wing message.
If you run anything that challenges that worldview, people will cancel their subscriptions.
It’s a viable economic model. But it’s not a viable model for finding facts.
Building a New Type of News Organization
Weiss left the Times in 2020. In 2022, she launched The Free Press.
Weiss’s goal with The Free Press is to report facts. Not opinions, not political talking points.
I think there’s a huge appetite for this. And sure enough, The Free Press has grown substantially, employing 50 people today.
However, Weiss is subject to the same incentives as big media orgs like the Times. Much of The Free Press’s revenue comes from subscriptions.
Its coverage tends to question left-wing ideas like giving sex changes to children. If Weiss reported a story that could be seen as favorable to the far left, subscribers might flee.
For now, The Free Press seems pretty straight down the middle. I hope it can stay that way.
How Sacks Read the News
Sacks shares Weiss’s concerns about media bias. And he offers a nice little trick to figure out who to listen to.
Sacks looks at how well a journalist predicts the future. If they do it well, he pays more attention to them. If they don’t, he unfollows them.
I love this approach!
Too often, we accord respect to any talking head. I often wonder, do these people actually know any more than I do?
Here’s how I find facts: stick to wire services and financial publications.
Wire services like AP aren’t supported by subscribers. And financial publications like Bloomberg or The Wall Street Journal have a stronger incentive than most to get facts straight. Their readers need accurate information on which to trade!
Wrap-Up
I’m glad that someone from inside the media is speaking out. A lot of what I see is blatantly biased to the left.
I stopped reading the Times years ago. And NPR, I’m tellin’ ya, you’re on thin ice.
I hope that journalists start more media organizations like The Free Press. A lot of Americans want the facts, no matter what the Times may think.
How do you find the best news?
Have a great weekend, everyone!
More on the All-In Summit:
Ukraine, China and the Deep State: Mearsheimer and Sachs at the All-In Summit
Peter Thiel at the All-In Summit
Two Million Miles Without a Fatality: Waymo’s CEO at the All-In Summit
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