LIE OF THE YEAR:
On Tuesday, Poynter-owned PolitiFact announced its “Lie of the Year,” an annual tradition going back 10 years. PolitiFact editor Angie Holan explained to readers why everyone in the fact-checking community takes the word “lie” seriously, and why this time of year is one of the only times you’ll ever hear someone from PolitiFact use that term.
“Fact-checking is about precision in language — reporting what we know to be true or false as best we can tell,” she writes. “That can be straightforward, but intention is a grayer, less certain. How do we know that the person speaking knew it wasn’t true? Sometimes, right or wrong, the speaker really believes it to be accurate. And sometimes there are reasonable differences over the substance of a claim and what it means.”
Read her column here.
PERSON OF THE YEAR: THE GUARDIANS
Donald Trump, first-runner up. That’s the call from Time Magazine’s editorial team in naming the 2018 Person of the Year.
“This year we are recognizing four journalists and one news organization who have paid a terrible price to seize the challenge of this moment: Jamal Khashoggi, Maria Ressa, Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo, and the Capital Gazette of Annapolis, Md.,” wrote Time editor-in-chief Edward Felsenthal in his piece about how the magazine made the decision. “They are representative of a broader fight by countless others around the world—as of Dec. 10, at least 52 journalists have been murdered in 2018—who risk all to tell the story of our time.”
Read the full story on the journalists and news organization honored here.
DUPONT WINNERS MADE PUBLIC
The duPont-Columbia Award winners were announced on Tuesday, and the organization noted that 14 of this year’s duPont Batons went to female-led reporting teams. Also of note: Partnerships between news organizations pooled skills and resources to better serve audiences.
“In a year of big news and upheaval for women, it is fitting that there has also been an extraordinary number of journalistic achievements by women,” said duPont Jury Chair and former NBC News Executive Cheryl Gould in a release. “We expect this welcome trend to continue and are confident that one day soon, this will go from being a notable trend to an established fact.”
PROPUBLICA DOUBLES LOCAL PROJECT
More than 200 local journalists from 43 states applied to be part of ProPublica’s second year in the Local Reporting Network. This year’s 14 newsrooms selected include the online nonprofit Connecticut Mirror, New York public radio station WNYC, California’s Sacramento Bee and The Birmingham News’s Reckon by al.com. Read more here.
Poynter’s ICYMI headlines:
- Minneapolis Star Tribune: From the Editors: Star Tribune film critic resigns after ethics breach (our top pick)
- Reuters: Statements marking one year that Reuters reporters Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo have been imprisoned in Myanmar
- Sacramento Business Journal: McClatchy to centralize design jobs in North Carolina
On Poynter.org
- This paper’s new editor — its youngest and first female — is fiercely protective of a changing institution. By Kristen Hare.
- Lester Holt delivers insights, laughs and a mean bass line. By Barbara Allen.
Upcoming training:
- Becoming a More Effective Writer: Clarity and Organization. Deadline: Jan. 4.
- The Craft of the Personal Essay. Deadline: Jan. 18.
From PolitiFact.com:
- 2018 Lie of the Year Readers’ Poll results. By Angie Drobnic Holan.
- The Trump file: Trump’s 10 top falsehoods of 2018. By Katie Sanders.
PolitiFact is a property of the Poynter Institute.
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