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The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation pledges $20 million to support newsrooms and provide journalism infrastructure as part of its commitment to revitalize local reporting. The grants will provide general operations and flexible support for infrastructure and shared services, along with direct support for local newsrooms. They are part of the foundation’s Local News Program, which supports Press Forward, a national initiative led by MacArthur to strengthen communities and democracy by supporting local news and information. The program was launched last year with a commitment of at least $150 million in new grantmaking to local news over five years, and the potential of $25 million in additional impact investments. “These investments are part of a collective effort to ensure that local communities have steady access to reliable and trustworthy information,” said MacArthur director of local news Silvia Rivera.
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| Paul Krugman |
Paul Krugman, who has written on political and economic topics for the New York Times for nearly 25 years, is retiring. His final column ran in the Dec. 6 edition of the Times. Spanning five US presidencies, his columns (and blog) looked at a wide range of issues on both the national and global level. In addition to his journalistic duties (which also included work on such platforms as Fortune and Slate), Krugman has authored 27 books and served on the faculties of MIT, Princeton, Stanford and the London School of Economics. He was also a staff member of the Council of Economic Advisers during the Reagan Administration. Among the many honors he has received is the 2008 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for his work on economic geography and international trade patterns. “Paul became an essential read in Opinion, helping countless readers become more fluent in and mindful of how trade, taxes, technology, the markets, labor and capital intersected with political leadership, ideology and partisanship to shape the lives of people across America and the world,” said New York Times opinion editor Kathleen Kingsbury.
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The Onion now faces a major roadblock in its attempt to buy Info Wars, the hotbed of conspiracy theory founded in 1999 by Alex Jones. Global Tetrahedron, owner of The Onion, is in a battle with First United American Companies, which is affiliated with Jones, for control of the site. Judge Christopher M. Lopez offederal bankruptcy court in Houston ruled that the bankruptcy auction did not maximize the amount of money that the sale of Info Wars should provide to Jones’s creditors. Those creditors include the families of the victims of the Sandy Hook shooting, who won a $1.4 billion defamation lawsuit against Jones for using his site to claim that the shooting was a hoax. Lopez mandated that a court-appointed trustee come up with an alternate solution.
CBS News Radio will go off the air on May 22, part of the axe-swinging managerial plan put into play by CBS editor-in-chief Bari Weiss... The Economist, which was first published in 1843, is changing hands. Canadian billionaire Stephen Smith has agreed to acquire a 26.9 percent stake in the publication from Lady Lynn Forester de Rothschild, her family and family foundation... Nexstar Media Group says it has closed its acquisition of TEGNA, the broadcast, digital media and marketing services company that was formed in 2015, when the Gannett Company split into two publicly traded companies.
USA TODAY brings on Jamie Stockwell as VP of news, effective March 30. Stockwell was most recently deputy managing editor of news for the Washington Post... YouTube expands its likeness detection capabilities to a pilot group of government officials, journalists and political candidates... The AP Fund for Journalism adds 50 news organizations to its local news program, bringing the total number of participating newsrooms to 100. 
Versant Media Group, the NBCUniversal cable TV spin-off, today reported its first financial results as 2025 revenues dipped 5.3 percent to $6.7B and standalone EBITDA dropped 9.1 percent to $2.2B.
Trump Media & Technology Group is discussing a spin-off of the Truth Social platform following the expected closing of its $6B merger deal with TAE Technologies... Condé Nast sells off Them, the digital LGBTQ-focused platform it launched in 2017, to Equalpride, publisher of Out, The Advocate, Out Traveler, Health PLUS Wellness and Pride.com... CBS News has parted ways with longevity influencer Peter Attia, one of the 19 contributors that editor-in-chief Bari Weiss brought on as part of her plan to present a wider variety of voices on the platform. 
Symbolic.ai forms a partnership with News Corp to begin using the company’s AI-native publisher platform in the newsrooms of News Corp publications to augment research, writing and publishing... Mediaite launches a newsletter that promises to give readers a summary of—media newsletters... The Fund for American Studies launches the Journalism Excellence Fellowship, a program that will provide promising young journalists the opportunity to work alongside top writers, reporters, and media professionals.
