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In Sir Walter Scott’s epic, but mostly forgotten, poem, “Marmion: A Tale of Flodden Field,” Scott penned his famous couplet: “Oh what a tangled web we weave / When first we practice to deceive.” Those lines resonate today when Americans are submerged in an ideological fog of artificial truth thanks to the American media. In step with them are digital social media platforms. In addition, our universities, political class, and elites are foisting information that is laden with lies and half-truths to promote their social and political agenda -- and they are doing it with some considerable success. These outlets’...

Medical researchers in Asia, Europe and the United States are working around the clock on ways to fight the Covid-19 pandemic, hunting for clues and crunching data from decades of studies on pathogens similar to the new coronavirus. The importance of that research was stressed on Friday when science authorities from 12 countries, including the US, Italy, and South Korea, released a statement urging corporate publishers of academic papers to make all relevant information openly and quickly available. “[We] urge publishers to voluntarily agree to make their Covid-19 and coronavirus-related publications, and the available data supporting them, immediately accessible,” it...

Imagine if two news publishers dominated digital media in the way that Facebook and Google do. The Government would not allow such a duopoly to stand. Campaigners would call for them to be broken up in the name of media plurality. Yet by 2020 Google and Facebook are expected to take 71 per cent of all the money spent in the UK on digital advertising, according to a report by analysts OC&C. The effect of this can already be seen and is devastating for both the news industry and for society in general.

The glory days of gentlemen's magazines are fading fast. Penthouse Magazine, the long-running and raunchier rival of Playboy, said Friday that it is ending its print edition after 50 years on the newsstand and will now only be offered in digital format. "Reimagined for the preferred consumption of content today by consumers, the digital version of Penthouse Magazine will combine and convert everything readers know and love about the print magazine experience to the power of a digital experience," publisher FriendFinder Network said in a statement. The move comes just months after Playboy announced that it would no longer publish...

Dollars are increasingly flowing from traditional ads to digital, as strong growth in mobile, video, and social spending continue to change the face of the US media market. Over the next five years, marketers will especially embrace mobile. Mobile will drive up spending on video, search, display, and social, and propel the migration of ad dollars away from traditional media, including newspapers and magazines. In this new report, BI Intelligence forecasts spending trends for the major digital ad formats -- including search, display, and video -- and mobile versus desktop. We also examine trajectories for social ad spending and programmatic...

Many institutions have their archives stored on CDs — but the discs aren't as stable as once thought. There is no average life span for a CD, says preservationist Michele Youket, "because there is no average disc." --- Back in the 1990s, historical societies, museums and symphonies across the country began transferring all kinds of information onto what was thought to be a very durable medium: the compact disc. Now, preservationists are worried that a lot of key information stored on CDs — from sound recordings to public records — is going to disappear. Some of those little silver discs...

Digital television streaming companies are forging ahead with their services following the conclusion of a Supreme Court case against Aereo Inc., despite the media company's loss in a copyright dispute brought on by traditional broadcasters. According to The New York Times, with clearer legal parameters for service delivery, dozens of digital media startups plan to move forward with innovations that offer ways to watch traditional cable broadcasting for a fraction of the cost. "If cable companies believe that their old ways of doing business are protected by the Aereo Supreme Court decision, they are clearly misguided," Dan Nova, a partner...

Dish Network said on Wednesday it will close all 300 or so retail locations of the Blockbuster video rental chain by January, closing a chapter on a brand that failed to compete in the digital world. Dish plans to lay off as many as 2,800 employees. Dish, the second-largest U.S. satellite TV company, bought the failed Blockbuster LLC video rental chain in a bankruptcy auction in 2011 for $320 million, a dramatic fall for a brand that at its peak in 2002 had a market value of $5 billion.

Dick Durbin: Are bloggers and tweeters entitled to constitutional protection? Share By Doug Powers • May 26, 2013 05:53 PM **Written by Doug Powers Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin has in the past had a very subjective and abstract view of the Constitution, and on Fox News Sunday he once again wondered which people might be “entitled” to constitutional protections and which people might not: “You’ve raised an important point and I heard Sen. Graham call for special counsel,” Durbin said. “I’m not ready to do this at this moment. I would like to know if Holder has any conflict in...

In what is becoming a well-settled pattern, Righthaven again finds itself on the losing end of a motion, with its case thrown out and owing the defendant – here, Leland Wolf, proprietor of the It Makes Sense Blog – costs and attorneys' fees for bringing a baseless copyright case. The lawsuit, Righthaven v. Wolf, is also notable for being the leading case among more than 50 that were filed in Colorado. Pending a motion to dismiss, the Colorado court stayed the remaining cases. With this ruling, the court has hopefully rung the death knell for the other remaining live cases...

Copyright troll Righthaven's flawed business model—suing hundreds of bloggers and small websites for dubious cases of alleged copyright infringement of newspaper articles—appears to be grinding to an inexorable finish. But even as the Righthaven cases prove that litigation isn't going to magically make print media profitable in the age of the Internet, a new generation of journalists and creators are adapting to the digital world—including one of Righthaven's former clients. Last week, reports were circulating that Righthaven was on "life support" after admitting that they aren't currently filing more lawsuits and are apparently teetering on the edge of bankruptcy. Even...

Veterans In Politics Talk Show Introduces Les LaMotte, Judge Hoeffgen, Chris Cannon LIVE on www.AllTalkRadio.net April 4: Les LaMotte Executive Producer Back Stage Digital Media: Christopher Cannon North Las Vegas Police Officer and candidate for North Las Vegas Municipal Court Judge: Sean Hoeffgen North Las Vegas Municipal Court Judge Department 2 and candidate for North Las Vegas Municipal Court Judge: "Veterans In Politics" is a weekly radio show produced by the Veterans In Politics International and hosted by Steve Sanson and Co-Hosted by J. "Sage" Bocook. The "Veterans In Politics" show is live every Saturday 2:05 PM Pacific Time you...

Back in 1960 the skills required to become President of the United States changed forever. That was the year that John F. Kennedy debated Richard M. Nixon on national network television for the first time. When reminiscing about Kennedy's win, pundits love to cite that he was tanned, good looking, had great hair and had his make-up professionally applied, while Mr. Nixon appeared pale, had a nervous demeanor and sweaty brow. They say that Nixon won on the radio but Kennedy won on TV. 1960 ushered in the era of the Network politician. For better or for worse, after the...

Looks like Amazon has already exhausted its stock of Kindle ebook readers. Has anyone gotten one? Any opinions you'd like to share? At first glance I thought it might be another hokey ebook reader, but today saw that my Amazon shopping cart has about 20 hardcopy books, and blog/RSS feeds on Flock are well over 50. It might be much more appealing to have all of those books and blogs on a single reader, *away from the computer*, and designed for simplicity and transparency. Amazon seems to be building its Kindle offerings at lightening speed. Thoughts?

New digital media features are boosting the CD and DVD burning capabilities of Macintosh computers, and are quickly and quietly transforming the rest of the electronics landscape as well. Last week, Santa Clara, Calif.-based Sonic Solutions (Nasdaq: SNIC) debuted a new technology, Toast 7 with Blu-ray Disc support, the first ever application of that kind for the Mac. The optical disc recording technology provides Mac users with the ability to store up to 50 GB of data on a Blu-ray recordable or Blu-ray rewritable disc. By Gene Koprowski

LONDON, England -- Video recorders have taken a step closer to extinction after Britain's largest electrical supplier said it would stop selling VCRs to concentrate on their successor, the DVD. [snip] Dixons said it now expected to sell its remaining stock of VCRs by Christmas, although other electrical retailers said they would continue to sell them for the foreseeable future.

Tinker with your MP3 player, get 5 years in jail By Thomas C Greene in Washington Posted: 07/29/2002 at 12:25 EST We were suspicious a few months back when US Senator Joseph Biden (Democrat, Delaware) introduced proposed legislation with Senator Fritz "Hollywood" Hollings (Democrat, South Carolina) to protect emblems of authenticity for digital media, such as holograms, with the same tough laws that criminalize bogus labels on designer-wear. A Biden aide told us at the time that the proposed legislation would have no effect on DRM features; it was merely meant to cover software and music packaging. We doubted it...