The scenes coming out of Southern California are the stuff of nightmares. Devastating fires are spreading at unbelievable speeds. A severe lack of rain in recent months, wind gusts reaching 100 miles per hour and low humidity combined to create what feels like an unstoppable wall of fire throughout Los Angeles County.

More than 1,000 homes, businesses and other buildings have burned. As of Wednesday, at least two people reportedly have been killed. Tens of thousands are under evacuation orders. CNN reports that first responders are being pushed “to their maximum limits.”

And there is no timetable for when the fires will be under control.

The Los Angeles Times called it “the most destructive firestorms to hit the region in memory.”

All three major television networks — ABC, CBS and NBC — broke into normally scheduled programming midday on Wednesday when officials gave a press conference on the wildfires in Southern California.

The main cable news networks — CNN, Fox News, MSNBC and NewsNation — have been holding (mostly) around-the-clock coverage.

I wanted to take a moment to point out two news organizations for their especially notable coverage: CNN and the Los Angeles Times.

A team of Times reporters continues to put out constantly updated coverage, which you can find here. The news outlet has dropped its paywall so readers can get the latest news.

Meanwhile, here is CNN’s live updates page.

This isn’t to downplay the work of other reporters at other news outlets. All have been outstanding, including The New York Times. But I found myself time and time again turning to CNN and the Los Angeles Times for their coverage, including this dramatic report from CNN’s Nick Watt and this close call from a CNN team trying to evacuate.

In addition, here is CNN’s Brian Stelter noting the outstanding work from local TV reporters in Los Angeles. Stelter noted, “L.A. stations are known for their helicopters, but the intense winds mean that virtually all the live shots are coming from the ground, not the air, making it difficult to see the full scope of the emergency. Live shots have been occasionally interrupted due to the brutal conditions, and some stations have relied on backup generators due to power outages.”

And check out Deadline’s Erik Pedersen with “Heartbreaking Interviews & Aerial Shots, Bulldozer Clears Abandoned Cars & More: Watch How Local TV Is Covering L.A. Wildfires.”

More terrific work

NBC News correspondent Jacob Soboroff, covering the wildfires in the neighborhood where he grew up. (Courtesy: NBC News)

Another example of superb work covering the wildfires was turned in by NBC News correspondent Jacob Soboroff, who is reporting on the ground in Palisades, where he grew up.

He called the fires “catastrophic,” explaining, “This is the community that I grew up in. I was born and raised in this neighborhood.”

In addition to the link above, check out this video and this photo from his Instagram account.

Reactions to Meta’s troubling message

One day later and we’re still trying to wrap our brains around Meta’s troubling decision to drop its third-party fact-checking program in favor of letting just any ol’ body police the site.

Meta boss Mark Zuckerberg, figuratively wrapping himself in an American flag, says it’s all about free speech and stopping censorship. But it’s pretty clear that he is bowing down to President-elect Donald Trump and conservatives who have complained for years when many of their unchecked talking points have been scrutinized for and identified as being untrue, unsubstantiated and untrustworthy.

Again, and to be clear, it’s Meta and not the fact-checkers who created the rules and regulations and, ultimately, were in charge of whatever penalties came with posting false information.

So now Facebook and Instagram and Threads will follow X’s lead of crowdsourced fact-checking.

But, Poynter’s Angela Fu writes, “experts are skeptical. Many fact-checkers say that X’s Community Notes program is ineffective, in some cases even furthering the spread of misinformation. And questions remain about how exactly Meta’s version will work — details that will ultimately determine its efficacy.”

Fu talks to several experts on the subject who are unconvinced about Meta’s plan.

Alex Mahadevan — director of MediaWise, Poynter’s digital media literacy project that teaches people of all ages how to spot misinformation online — writes, “Meta will attempt crowdsourced fact-checking. Here’s why it won’t work.”

Mahadevan writes that “Meta’s plan is doomed to fail” for several reasons that he lays out in his piece, which I encourage you to read.

He adds, “Despite my criticism, I remain a big believer in crowdsourced fact-checking — but as one spoke in a real trust and safety program, which was how it was originally envisioned at Twitter. If Meta is truly following X’s example, it will greatly exacerbate the misinformation problem on Facebook and Instagram. Take one look at your X feed today. Is it more factual than it was three years ago?  A crowdsourced fact-checking solution is only as effective as the platform, owners and developers behind it. And it appears Meta is more interested in ‘more speech’ than it is in tackling misinformation.”

Pertinent tweets

With us all talking about Meta’s controversial decision to drop its third-party fact-checking program, I found this tweet from NPR’s Brian Mann to be particularly worthwhile:

As Meta announces the end to professional fact-checking, please -please- accept finally that social media is not a viable way to get factual information. It was a noble experiment. It failed. Traditional journalism, while imperfect, is the way. Please pay a little bit and use it.

Mann also tweeted this, which makes some salient points as well:

Important: If you’re conservative, find a really good ethical conservative news outlet. They exist, they’re great. But if your info source (on the right or left) never reports things that makes you uncomfortable and only feeds your anger and ideology? It’s not real journalism.

And one more from Mann:

Americans who think they can rawdog an accurate picture of the world by staring into the morass of social media wind up poorly informed and miserable. One of the most toxic social media lies is that the world is garbage. Journalism offers a more balanced, human view of the world.

Vice President Bartiromo?

Alex Isenstadt, a national political reporter at Politico, has a new book coming out about Donald Trump called “Revenge: The Inside Story of Trump’s Return to Power.”

Two excerpts from the book were shared with CNN’s Hadas Gold. Both are eyebrow-raising.

First, Isenstadt reported that Trump seriously considered picking Fox Business anchor Maria Bartiromo to be his running mate. While Bartiromo is nowhere near qualified to be vice president, one could easily understand why Trump would consider her. She was a “Trump favorite” because she constantly defended him at nearly every turn and, according to the book, “(conducted) numerous softball interviews with him over the years, including his first on-air sit-down following the 2020 election, for which she had given his team a heads-up on her questions ahead of time.”

Fortunately, Trump’s team talked Trump out of picking Bartiromo.

And speaking of a heads-up on questions, Isenstadt alleges in his book that Trump was fed questions ahead of a January 2024 town hall with Fox News.

Isenstadt writes, “About thirty minutes before the town hall was due to start, a senior aide started getting text messages from a person on the inside at Fox. Holy (expletive), the team thought. They were images of all the questions Trump would be asked and the planned follow-ups, down to the exact wording. Jackpot. This was like a student getting a peek at the test before the exam started.”

In a statement to Poynter, a Fox News spokesperson said, “While we do not have any evidence of this occurring, and Alex Isenstadt has conveniently refused to release the images for fact checking, we take these matters very seriously and plan to investigate should there prove to be a breach within the network.”

Interview of the day

President Joe Biden, shown here earlier this month. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

President Joe Biden was interviewed by USA Today Washington bureau chief Susan Page in what is believed to be the lone sit-down interview he is doing with a print publication as he leaves office.

(Here is Page’s story and here is the transcript of the interview.)

Biden told Page he believed he would have beaten Donald Trump had he not dropped out of the race, but was less sure about having the vigor to serve another four years as president.

Biden told Page, “So far, so good. But who knows what I’m going to be when I’m 86 years old?”

But when asked if he would have beaten Trump, Biden said, “It’s presumptuous to say that, but I think yes.” Biden pointed to polling as the reason he felt he would have won.

Biden said in his meeting with Trump after the election that Trump did compliment him on the economy. Biden said, “He was very complimentary about some of the economic things I had done. And he talked about — he thought I was leaving with a good record.”

Check out the nearly one-hour interview, where Biden also talks about fears of Trump’s presidency, and what regrets he has as he leaves office.

In her story, Page wrote, “To be sure, many analysts doubt Biden could have won another term from voters who were gloomy about inflation and eager for change. What’s more, his shuffling gait and verbal miscues had raised questions about his fitness for office. Through an interview that stretched for nearly an hour, Biden was engaged and loquacious, though at times he spoke so softly that it was difficult to hear him. On his desk were index cards that seemed to have talking points and statistics, but he glanced at them only once, at the end, as if to make sure he had mentioned the items most important to him.”

Speaking of the Biden interview, The Washington Post’s Philip Bump has a good column: “No, Joe Biden would not have won the election.”

A promising news site is closed

For this one, I turn it over to my Poynter colleague, Kristen Hare.

In 2017, when Poynter reported on the new “socially-focused brand” from an Alabama newspaper company, everything Reckon was doing felt promising. They were on social platforms where audiences were, they were attempting a new kind of journalism based on listening first, and they sustained deep and impactful reporting.

Until now. On Wednesday, several staffers tweeted that the vertical from al.com, owned by Advance Publications, had closed and some staff were laid off.

Reckon has evolved since it first launched, and its website now notes it’s “an award-winning national news organization that covers the people powering change, the challenges shaping our time, and what it means for all of us.”

Nieman Lab’s Sarah Scire reports on X that 11 staffers were laid off.

Media tidbits

• The Associated Press’ David Bauder with “CNN defamation trial comes at a rough time for legacy media — and for the struggling network.”
• The Associated Press’ Nicole Winfield with “An Italian journalist is freed from detention in Iran and returns home.”
• Great news. ESPN college basketball announcer Dick Vitale, who has been battling cancer of his vocal cords for the past few years, announced last month that he is cancer free. On Wednesday, he wrote on X that his doctor said his vocal cords have recovered enough for him to again call games. Vitale, 85, started at ESPN in 1979.
• Awful Announcing’s Sean Keeley, Ben Koo and Drew Lerner with “Main Street Sports hiring former ESPN exec Norby Williamson to oversee FanDuel Sports Network production.”
• The Athletic is launching a new weekly newsletter called MoneyCall, which will be curated by Dan Shanoff and will focus on The Athletic’s sports business and media reporting.

Hot type

• ProPublica’s Joshua Kaplan with “The Militia and the Mole.”
• For The New Republic, Robert Costa with “‘You Should Run for President’: Jimmy Carter’s Ad Man Speaks.”
• New York Times critic at large Amanda Hess with “At the Movies, the ‘Older Woman’ Is Growing Up.”

More resources for journalists

• Our training for public media executives application period ends today, Jan. 9.
• Lead With Influence is for leaders who manage big responsibilities but have no direct reports. Apply by Jan. 10.
• Transform Local Crime Coverage in your newsroom. Application period ends Jan. 17.

Have feedback or a tip? Email Poynter senior media writer Tom Jones at tjones@poynter.org.

The Poynter Report is our daily media newsletter. To have it delivered to your inbox Monday-Friday, sign up here.