For the Record

Apple Daily Employees Plead Guilty in Hong Kong Press Freedom Case: 

Six senior journalists and business managers at the Hong Kong-based pro-democracy Apple Daily tabloid have "pleaded guilty to foreign collusion in a landmark case where the China-imposed national security law was used against a news organization and its staff," according to a Deutsche Welle wire report. The media workers (including Publisher Cheung Kim-hung, Associated Publisher Chan Pui-man, Editor-in-Chief Ryan Law, Executive Editor-in-Chief Lam Man-chung, and Editorial Writers Fung Wai-kong and Yeung Ching-kee) "all admitted to conspiring with [Apple Daily Founder] Jimmy Lai to call for sanctions and blockades against China and Hong Kong in a courtroom on Tuesday," the report continued. Although prosecutors "refrained from adding sedition charges in exchange for the six pleading guilty to collusion," the staffers now face a maximum sentence of life in prison under China's 2020 National Security Law. Nevertheless, sentencing is unlikely to occur until pending cases against Lai and the newspaper are adjudicated. (Lai pleaded not guilty to analogous collusion charges in August and is currently completing prison sentences related to his alleged role in organizing pro-democracy protests.) Over the past two decades, press freedom in Hong Kong "[has] deteriorated steadily [...], its global ranking in press freedom dropping from 18th position in 2002 to 148th position in 2022, according to Reporters Without Borders," the report added. "It fell 50 places just in the last year." Launched two years before the sovereignty of Hong Kong was transferred from the United Kingdom to the People's Republic of China in 1997, Apple Daily "was one of the harsher voices against China for years and backed the pro-democracy movement during the 2019 nation-wide protests," according to the report. In June 2021, the publication "shut its offices after its bank accounts were frozen and several senior members accused of putting national security at risk. Since its introduction in 2020, the national security law has been used by Hong Kong's pro-Beijing officials to silence dissent," resulting in the dismissal of more than 1,000 journalists. 

Apple Daily Reporters Plead Guilty in Hong Kong Press Freedom Case:

Six senior journalists at the Hong Kong-based pro-democracy Apple Daily tabloid have "pleaded guilty to foreign collusion in a landmark case where the China-imposed national security law was used against a news organization and its staff," according to a Deutsche Welle wire report. The media workers (including Publisher Cheung Kim-hung, Associated Publisher Chan Pui-man, Editor-in-Chief Ryan Law, Executive Editor-in-Chief Lam Man-chung, and Editorial Writers Fung Wai-kong and Yeung Ching-kee) "all admitted to conspiring with [Apple Daily Founder] Jimmy Lai to call for sanctions and blockades against China and Hong Kong in a courtroom on Tuesday," the report continued. Although prosecutors "refrained from adding sedition charges in exchange for the six pleading guilty to collusion," the staffers now face a maximum sentence of life in prison under China's 2020 National Security Law. Nevertheless, sentencing is unlikely to occur until pending cases against Lai and the newspaper are adjudicated. (Lai pleaded not guilty to analogous collusion charges in August and is currently completing prison sentences related to his alleged role in organizing pro-democracy protests.) Over the past two decades, press freedom in Hong Kong "[has] deteriorated steadily [...], its global ranking in press freedom dropping from 18th position in 2002 to 148th position in 2022, according to Reporters Without Borders," the report added. "It fell 50 places just in the last year." Launched two years before the sovereignty of Hong Kong was transferred from the United Kingdom to the People's Republic of China in 1997, Apple Daily "was one of the harsher voices against China for years and backed the pro-democracy movement during the 2019 nation-wide protests," according to the report. In June 2021, the publication "shut its offices after its bank accounts were frozen and several senior members accused of putting national security at risk. Since its introduction in 2020, the national security law has been used by Hong Kong's pro-Beijing officials to silence dissent," resulting in the dismissal of more than 1,000 journalists. 

Simon & Schuster Deal Collapses:

Simon & Schuster parent company Paramount Global "will let its $2.2 billion sale to Penguin Random House collapse on Monday, opening the door for a new suitor to try to clinch a deal, according to people familiar with the matter," Abigail Summerville and Anirban Sen of Reuters reported yesterday. The proposed merger "was blocked on Nov. 1 by a federal judge on antitrust grounds," with German media group and Penguin parent company Bertelsmann SE & Co failing to convince Paramount "to help launch an appeal and extend the deal contract before it expires on Monday," Summerville and Sen added. Under provisions allowing for the collapse, Bertelsmann "will owe Paramount a $200 million break-up fee." In one of the most significant American antitrust cases in decades, the U.S. Justice Department "had sued to stop the tie-up of the two publishers, which combined would have accounted for more than 25% of all print books sold in the United States this year," according to Summerville and Sen. "In its complaint, it argued the deal would lead to lower earnings for authors because of the reduced competition," they continued, with bestselling "King of Horror" Stephen King (whose oeuvre has been primarily owned by Simon & Schuster imprint Scribner since 2015) "[testifying] in favor of the government's arguments during the trial." Penguin writers "include cookbook author Ina Garten and novelists Zadie Smith and Danielle Steele, while Simon & Schuster publishes King, Jennifer Weiner and Hillary Rodham Clinton, among others." Fellow "Big Five" publishers HarperCollins (which is controlled by Rupert Murdoch's News Corp) and Lagardere SCA's Hachette Book Group have expressed interest in purchasing Simon & Schuster; in 2020, the former company "also unsuccessfully bid for Simon & Schuster." Paramount's control of Simon & Schuster effectively commenced in January 1975, when the publisher was purchased by antecedent holding company Gulf and Western in an 8-for-1 stock swap. (Former Pulitzer Administrator Dana Canedy was publisher of Simon & Schuster's flagship eponymous imprint from 2020 to 2022, while former Pulitzer Board Co-Chair Mindy Marqués is the publisher's vice president and executive editor.)

Ned Rorem (1923-2022):

1976 Music winner Ned Rorem died Friday at his home in Manhattan, according to a Washington Post obituary written by 1997 Criticism winner Tim Page. He was 99. A multivalent talent who characterized himself as "a composer who also writes, not a writer who also composes," Rorem "first gained fame when he was in his 20s as a composer of 'art songs' — taut musical settings of poetry that were intended to be sung by classically trained vocalists, usually including an elaborate part for piano that was less accompaniment than full complement to the melody," Page added. "From the beginning, he had a clear understanding of what the human voice could and could not do. His melodies, although strenuous at times and moderately dissonant, were invariably linear, and the words usually came out in a natural, unforced rhythm, almost as enhanced speech, easy for a listener to follow." Although Rorem "had written more than 400 such songs, as well as three symphonies, several one-act operas and a great deal of chamber music" by his fortieth birthday, "making him one of America’s most prolific composers," he was "at least as well known" for his published diaries as for his music. These collections (commencing with 1966's "The Paris Diary" and continuing with such works as "Later Diaries" [1974] and "The Nantucket Diary of Ned Rorem" [1987]) foregrounded frank accounts of the "author's sex life, which was both gay and many-partnered at a time when neither proclivity was considered a fit subject for conversation," as exemplified by notable relationships with such contemporaries as Noël Coward, 1948 Music winner Virgil Thomson and 1979 Fiction winner John Cheever. Raised by a Quaker family in Chicago, Rorem attended Northwestern University, the Curtis Institute of Music and the Juilliard School, ultimately receiving his undergraduate (1946) and master's (1948) degrees from the latter institution. During this period, he completed private tutorials with Thomson (who employed him as a copyist and assistant following his departure from Curtis, where he had held a significant scholarship), two-time Music winner Gian Carlo Menotti and 1945 Music winner Aaron Copland. After spending much of the Fifties abroad in Morocco and Paris, he settled in New York in 1957, also teaching at Curtis (where his students included 2010 Music winner Jennifer Higdon) for many years. Although he eventually vanquished his alcohol dependence — ultimately abstaining for nearly fifty years — and enjoyed a "long period of happy domesticity [...] with the organist James Holmes, who died in 1999," Rorem remained known for his piquant critiques of other artists, running the gamut from Beethoven ("outmoded") to William S. Burroughs ("hype, the mask of the ungifted, was never more in evidence than on the PBS portrait of [his] charmless ego") and Truman Capote (“sold his talent for a mess of pottage"). Notwithstanding these contretemps, in an influential 1968 essay for The New York Review of Books, he lauded The Beatles for "[removing] sterile martyrdom from art" and "[reviving] the sensual [...] Their sweetness lies in that they doubtless couldn't care less about these pedantic explications." According to Page, Rorem "told the Hartford Courant in 1993 that he was shocked at receiving the Pulitzer because he felt the 'stuffy' music establishment would rather punish him for his 'wicked ways.'" He added: "But it sort of gives you a certain authority. My name is now always preceded by 'Pulitzer Prize-winning composer.'" In addition to his diaries, Rorem also published several volumes of nonfiction (mostly clustered around music criticism), a collection of letters and a "limited-edition" collection of his correspondence with the Tangier-based writer/composer Paul Bowles.

Pulitzer Board Member Barnes to Succeed McGrory as Globe Editor:

Pulitzer Prize Board member Nancy Barnes will succeed longtime Boston Globe Editor Brian McGrory effective February 1, the newspaper announced Monday. Barnes will be the first woman in the role in the publication's 150-year history. "Nancy is renowned for her commitment to high-quality journalism, her excellent leadership skills, and her passion for innovation," said Linda Henry, chief executive officer of Boston Globe Media Partners. "She not only brings the leadership experience of being the top editor of two different metro newspapers, but she also transitioned to running a digital and audio newsroom that has been an industry leader in connecting with new and vast audiences." McGrory, who has held the role for the past decade, will become chair of Boston University's journalism department while continuing to serve as a columnist at the newspaper. According to Globe Columnist Larry Edelman, Barnes (who was born in Cambridge and lived in Greater Boston for part of her youth) interned at the newspaper while studying at the University of Virginia and "later worked as a reporter at The Lowell Sun." She is the first editor to be hired by John and Linda Henry, who purchased the publication from The New York Times Company in 2013 while electing to keep McGrory in the role. "The Globe has long been one of the nation's most respected news organizations," said Barnes. "I am thrilled and honored to partner with its talented staff during a time of such exciting transformation and innovation in the industry. It's a great opportunity that rarely comes along." Following celebrated tenures as the top editor at the Star Tribune of Minneapolis and the Houston Chronicle, Barnes "joined National Public Radio four years ago as senior vice president for news and editorial director, overseeing more than 500 journalists and executives worldwide," Edelman added. "During her tenure, Barnes expanded NPR’s investigative and enterprise reporting, as well as its coverage of climate change, race and social justice, and threats to American democracy. She also committed significant resources to cover the pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine." In September, she announced her intention to step down from that role, "citing a decision by NPR's chief executive officer to create a more senior position to oversee both news and programming, the latter of which includes podcasts and shows such as 'Wait Wait . . . Don’t Tell Me!'". She also will continue to serve on the Pulitzer Board and the Peabody Awards' East Coast board of directors.

Twitter Rescinds 'Potentially Spammy' Label on Op-Ed Criticizing Musk:

Twitter removed a warning label that characterized a Mediaite opinion piece about Elon Musk as "potentially spammy" early Saturday following reports from "multiple media outlets," according to the news organization's Michael Luciano. The post, entitled "What Elon Musk Is Doing Right at Twitter" and also written by Luciano, employed striking brevity to assert that the technology magnate (who completed his acquisition of the platform in late October) has failed in his objectives: "The entirety of the post’s text reads, 'Nothing.'" According to Luiciano, Twitter users "who clicked on the article in their timelines were taken to a page telling them the link violates the company’s URL policy and that it may be 'unsafe.' [...] It is unclear if Twitter's algorithm determined the piece to be too terse, and therefore unfit for users of the microblogging site who sometimes communicate solely via memes and emojis. Likewise, it is not clear if the link was actively censored." Although Twitter and Musk "did not respond to inquiries asking which, if any, policies the content may have violated," Musk has previously "cast himself as a fierce free speech advocate seeking to change the censorious ways of the platform." Previously, in a tweet posted shortly after he signed the acquisition deal in April, he enjoined his "worst critics" to "remain on Twitter, because that is what free speech means." However, in 2018, Musk "phoned the employer of a portfolio manager named Lawrence Fossi, a self-described conservative, who at the time was writing articles critical of Tesla that questioned the company’s financial statements," Luciano added. According to Fossi, a colleague relayed a litigatory threat from the billionaire and said that Musk told him that Fossi was a "very bad person." Fossi suspended his activities but has "since resumed his public criticisms after leaving his former employer."

FTX Collapse May Affect News Organizations Following Bankman-Fried Pledges:

The sudden bankruptcy of cryptocurrency exchange FTX has begun to reverberate in myriad spheres (including philanthropy, politics and media) due to the implications of potentially unfulfilled pledges from its founder and former chief executive, Samuel Bankman-Fried, according to Theodore Schleifer of Puck. "To understand the jaw-dropping developments of the last week, you first have to understand the gravitational pull that [Bankman-Fried] has exerted for the last two years," Schleifer continued. "The son of Stanford professors—his mother founded the hot donor network Mind the Gap; his dad, ironically, taught tax law—S.B.F. and his younger brother Gabe hired aggressively for their sprawling empire of influence, creating a Bahamas-shuttling network of consultants and lobbyists and donor-advisers who tried to help the 30-year-old create his dream world in media, pandemic-prevention policy, and nuclear nonproliferation alike. More important than the hundreds of millions a year that he appeared ready to spend to achieve his vision, S.B.F. epitomized something at a symbolic level—a new, younger generation of 'effective altruism'-inspired donors intent on blending politics, philanthropy and data science, with little genuflection to the political or philanthropic establishment and a larger-than-normal appetite for risk." Rather than employing a centralized foundation, Bankman-Fried's philanthropic endeavors were divided among a variety of organizations, including the FTX Future Fund, characterized by Schleifer as "the flagship foundation created by S.B.F. and other top executives at the company that promised to give away hundreds of millions of dollars annually and has already distributed $160 million this past year"; Guarding Against Pandemics, a lobbying organization that served as the "central node" of Bankman-Fried's Democratic Party-oriented political efforts; and Building A Stronger Future, a family foundation administered by Bankman-Fried and his brother that invested in a variety of for-profit and nonprofit news organizations, including ProPublica, Vox, The Intercept and Semafor. According to Schleifer, it is "not clear that all of the assets there are segregated for charity" as of Thursday; for example, the FTX Future Fund "is actually a collection of vehicles: a 501(c)3 foundation called FTX Foundation Inc. and several donor-advised funds of its board members, along with other, undisclosed vehicles if the Future Fund wants to back a for-profit company [...] If those vehicles did not diversify and are holding FTX equity right now, then what constitutes the 'FTX Future Fund' could be bankrupt, too." In a Thursday statement, the Fund "said that 'many committed grants' wouldn’t 'be able to be honored,' a statement that suggests the absence of sufficient cash in any of their coffers." Although Building A Stronger Future has yet to file a tax return — rendering many of its precise activities opaque — sources have told Schleifer that "there is a buy-out clause in the Semafor deal terms, which would allow them to claw back shares from an investor." 

NPR Launches Podcast Bundle:

National Public Radio "launched a paid podcast bundle on Tuesday, giving subscribers access to bonus content, ad-free episodes, and other perks from nearly a dozen NPR podcasts including Planet Money, Fresh Air, and Code Switch," according to Sarah Scire of NiemanLab. "To join NPR+," she added, "listeners must make a new recurring contribution to their local member station starting at $8/month or $96/year." In contrast to a preexisting pilot program that purveyed single podcast subscriptions, the bundle "is getting a very soft launch" and "will only be available in the 34 locations where a member station is participating in the program." Accordingly, "listeners with IP addresses that put them in, say, New York City or Boston will only see single show subscriptions available for now, while those living in Orlando or Baltimore or Normal, Illinois can choose the bundled NPR+ option." Bonus content will range from "extended interviews, listener Q&As, and show-specific tidbits like Planet Money Movie Club" to early access to certain episodes. "We wanted to differentiate bonus content from the core offering, both for philosophical reasons and editorial reasons," said Program Manager Leda Marritz. "Planet Money is a highly polished, highly produced work of art, right? They can’t do that and a piece of bonus content, too. It would just not be achievable on an ongoing basis." Marritz also "emphasized the technical hurdles involved in linking a subscription to a recurring local donation," as participating stations employ myriad payment, content management and donor management systems. "This is not 'get rich quick,'" Marritz said. "We're not expecting stratospheric success right out of the gate. This group of 34 stations is basically going to be an informal advisory body for this product. We're obviously going to be staying very close to them, hearing what's working, hearing what’s not working, triaging those, and addressing them as much as possible." Scire added: "The fact that NPR+ subscriptions will only be available to new recurring donors at first was a sticking point for some stations presumably worried about antagonizing current members while recruiting their next generation of donors. NPR heard 'loud and clear' from 'many, many stations' that they only wanted to offer NPR+ when the technological infrastructure was in place to offer the bundle to their existing members, too." Furthermore, the move coincides with the ongoing decline of radio audiences (half of AM/FM listening in the United States occurs during car commutes, which have been less prevalent since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. "For some stations, moving into a digital-focused strategy is a shift. Many of them still live in the broadcast world, uh, very firmly," said Marritz. "There’s just a real variety — you get some for whom this feels like a really comfortable program to opt into, and you get some for whom this feels like a much bigger shift from how they're operating in the day-to-day."

Sy Presten (1924-2022):

Venerable publicist Sy Presten died on October 18 at his home in Manhattan, Alex Traub of The New York Times reported Sunday. He was 98 and succumbed to esophageal dysphagia, according to his wife, Joanne Presten. In the decade preceding his death, Presten was one of the last living links in American media to the "'item' — a short, discrete section of a gossip column" popularized by such syndicated news commentators as Walter Winchell and Ed Sullivan in the early postwar era; according to Traub, these figures had the "power to make or break reputations in sentence-long wisecracks" amid an evanescent period (notably dramatized in Alexander Mackendrick's 1957 film noir drama "Sweet Smell of Success") where "national attention was focused on New York theater, sports and nightlife [...] Millions of newspaper readers cared less about what happened in the Senate and the White House than in the Stork Club and the Copacabana." In this milieu, nightclub proprietors, entertainment figures and business magnates employed Presten and other "press agents" as interlocutors "for the sake of their glorification." Traub continued: "Presten sent Winchell 12 pages of material a week. The exchange rate: Four or five free items — mainly topical quips and juicy morsels of gossip — earned you one item mentioning a client." As suburban enchroachment and the rise of the Sun Belt threatened to supplant midcentury Manhattan's urbane glamour in the 1970s and 1980s, he proved to be indefagitably mutable, retaining grittier clients like the Chock Full o’Nuts fast-food chain and Penthouse magazine. While "growing obsolescence" characterized much of his later output, Presten played an integral role in facilitating the television career of realtor Barbara Corcoran in the late 2000s and often was profiled by the New York press in recent years. "Reporters delighted in his antique vernacular: 'You’re killing me here,' 'Listen to this,' 'For Christ almighty,'" Traub added. "When young curious types visited him, [...] Presten reeled off the names of the A-, B- and C-list celebrities he represented in decades past, searching his visitors' faces for flickers of recognition." Born and raised in Poughkeepsie, Presten (born Seymour Herman Prutinsky) received a degree in journalism from New York University in 1945. He also is survived by a son from his first marriage and a grandson.

Justice Department Codifies Journalism Protections:

The United States Department of Justice has "formally banned the use of subpoenas, warrants or court orders to seize reporters' communications records or demand their notes or testimony in an effort to uncover confidential sources in leak investigations, in what amounts to a major policy shift," Charlie Savage of The New York Times reported Wednesday. According to Savage, the new regulations "institutionalize — and in places expand — a temporary policy that Attorney General Merrick B. Garland put in place in July 2021, after the revelation that the Justice Department, under Attorney General William P. Barr, had secretly pursued email records of reporters at The New York Times, The Washington Post and CNN." In a statement, Garland said the regulations "recognize the crucial role that a free and independent press plays in our democracy [...] Because freedom of the press requires that members of the news media have the freedom to investigate and report the news, the new regulations are intended to provide enhanced protection to members of the news media from certain law enforcement tools and actions that might unreasonably impair news gathering." Savage added that the "broad prohibitions" contrast viscerally with the long-term "crackdown" in leak investigations that suffused bipartisan presidencies throughout the early 21st century, often placing "pressure on reporting on matters of national security." New York Times Publisher A. G. Sulzberger (who was "put under a gag order in 2021 that shielded from his own newsroom's view a legal fight over the email logs of Times journalists") lauded the decision while also calling on Congress to further codify the protections in a federal shield law that would "help ensure that these reforms are lasting." Exceptions to the regulations would "apply to situations in which a reporter is under investigation for something unconnected to news gathering, situations in which a member of the news media is deemed an agent of a foreign power or a member of a foreign terrorist group, or 'when necessary to prevent an imminent or concrete risk of death or serious bodily harm,'" Savage continued. In forming the regulations, the Justice Department consulted with Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press Executive Director Bruce D. Brown and representatives from several major national news organizations, including The Times, The Post, The Associated Press, CBS News, CNN, Wall Street Journal parent company Dow Jones, NBC News and The New Yorker. These discussions "led to several adjustments about potentially critical issues, like how 'news gathering' is defined," Savage revealed. "According to participants, the Justice Department originally intended to define it in a way that was limited to the passive receipt of government secrets. But the final version now covers the act of pursuing information." Although "news gathering" has been defined as "the process by which a member of the news media collects, pursues, or obtains information or records for purposes of producing content intended for public dissemination" (also encompassing classified information from confidential sources), the Department did not establish a standard for identifying journalists — "a notoriously murky task in the internet era, when anyone can disseminate information," according to Savage. Instead, the assistant attorney general for the Department's criminal division will adjudicate these matters on a case-by-case basis, while the attorney general may intervene "if that official finds 'genuine uncertainty' on whether an act falls within the scope of news gathering."