• One Minute of News vs. 162 Minutes of Ads

    Timothy Karr
    October 2, 2012

    Denver is playing host to the first presidential debate of 2012, but for TV viewers in the Rocky Mountain State, the political mudslinging has been going on for months, thanks in large part to the deluge of political ads from Super PACs and other third-party groups.

  • News on the Go

    Josh Stearns
    October 1, 2012

    A few years ago, the Pew research team, which produces an annual State of the News Media report, declared that people are for the most part now “news grazers” who seek out information from a variety of sources and on a range of platforms.

    Now a new report from Pew suggests that we are not only moving around to find our news but also taking our news with us.

  • The Declaration Goes for the Ride of Its Life

    Alexandra Martines
    September 25, 2012

    The Declaration of Internet Freedom sure is going places.

    In fact, this October the document will travel from Colorado to Kentucky as part of reddit’s Internet 2012 Bus Tour.

  • Justice Delayed

    Chancellar Williams
    September 25, 2012

    It’s been almost a decade since Martha Wright filed the lawsuit that led to a petition asking the Federal Communications Commission to address the high cost of prison phone calls — which can climb as high as $17 for a 15-minute call. This was a personal issue for Ms. Wright, who was struggling to stay in touch with a grandson who was incarcerated out of state. She couldn’t easily visit her grandson, who was transferred to multiple prisons over the course of his sentence, and because she’s blind she couldn’t communicate with him via mail.

  • TV Stations Accept Political Ad Cash -- and Leave Viewers in the Dark

    Timothy Karr
    September 24, 2012
    The political ad invasion is upon us. Media analysts project that campaigns, Super PACs and “social welfare” groups will spend a record-breaking $3.3 billion on political ads by Election Day. For the local stations that air these ads, it’s a political goldmine. But what’s a cash windfall for stations is a nuisance for tens of millions of viewers.

  • Hey, Internet Users: Register to Vote!

    Josh Levy
    September 21, 2012
    When we write the history of the Internet, we’ll remember 2012 as the year Internet users realized their political power. Now,Fight for the Future is teaming up with Personal Democracy Media to launch The Internet Votes, a project to get Internet users who were fired up about online censorship fired up about something else: voting.

  • Diversity? What Diversity?

    Joseph Torres
    September 21, 2012
    A study released this week provides more evidence that our nation’s media inequality is deepening, with too few people of color working in decision-making positions at local TV news outlets. More than half of the stations surveyed do not employ a single person of color in a management position

  • Battling a Mean Receptionist and Ice Cream Madness to Inspect Political Files

    Libby Reinish
    September 21, 2012
    My Political Ad Sleuth road trip was often a solitary adventure. So when I arrived in Albuquerque, the last stop on my whirlwind four-city tour — which also included stops at TV stations in Denver, Detroit and Toledo — I was excited to see some familiar faces. With 20 station visits under my belt, I was feeling confident. What could go wrong?

  • What's Wrong With This Picture?

    Josh Levy
    September 21, 2012
    The XOXO Festival was about a vision of the Internet. Not “an” Internet. The Internet. But if the group you’ve convened to talk about the Internet contains little to no diversity, that vision is, well, blurry.

  • Staples, Paper Jams and Security in Miami

    Josh Stearns
    September 19, 2012

    Security is no joke at Miami’s local TV stations. All six stations I visited were behind tall fences with a gauntlet of security guards and call boxes. After my third or fourth attempt to explain to a security guard what the political files were, why I wanted to look at them and why I did not need an appointment to do so, I got to thinking about all the hoops I have had to jump through and bizarre conversations I have had in my political ad sleuth travels.

    Here is a rundown:

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