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The folks at The Big Lead Sports decided to poll members of the sports media to see just how far left they are, and the results are about what you would expect.

The Big Lead polled 51 members of the sports media, allowing their answers to remain anonymous, to encourage the media to fill out the survey without fear of being outed as liberals. The site also polled 312 readers as a control group to see if the media was more, less, or the same politically as the sites readers.

The poll revealed that most considered themselves Democrats or independents, with 58 percent calling themselves Democrats and 37 percent claiming to be independents. As to the GOP, well, only three respondents (a measly 6 percent) said they were Republican.

The Big Lead points out that a recent Gallop poll said the breakdown above is far out of whack compared to the general population which sees 31 percent each claiming to be Democrat or Republican and 37 percent claiming to be independent.

However, party affiliation was the least of the sites poll finding, when asked if they were socially liberal, 76.5 percent said they were extremely liberal.

When the question turned to how they cast their vote in 2016, a whopping 80.4 percent said they voted for 2016 loser Hillary Clinton. While only a few said they cast their ballot for Donald Trump. In fact, more sports reporters said they didnt vote at all (9.8 percent) than said they voted for Trump.

For its control group, the sites readers voted for Clinton at 50.3 percent, while Trump and a third party candidate each got 20 percent.

The sports reporters also favored abortion (86.3 percent) while the general readers were closer to the middle (55.8 percent). In addition, 88.2 percent called themselves firm believers in global warming, while the readers only accepted climate change at 48 percent.

Gun ownership was also rejected by the sports reporters at a number far higherthan that of regular Americans. Of all the reporters asked, only three polled said they owned a gun. Meanwhile, national average fro gun ownership in America is 36 percent.

The reporters also self-identified as leftists in other ways. All but one chose left-wing news sources as their main sources of news, 78.4 percent agreed that sports media should be very liberal, and 76.5 percent wanted to see pot legalized.

In its conclusion, The Big Lead makes a point that has been echoed by other members of the sports media recently not that this conclusion helps the matter.

The sports media clearly leans left. But, it may be a stretch to say that alienates a significant portion of the audience, Ty Duffy wrote. The sports media is clustered in major cities and along the coasts because thats where much of its audience is.

This makes sense, most sports writers work for big media outfits in places like New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago.

However, this also means that a relatively small community of liberal sports writers in liberal enclaves, are writing for a massive percentage of the country. Which, according to the numbers in this poll, do not hold the same values or opinions. While that has probably always been true in media, to some extent, given that media has always been coastal and liberal. However, one wonders if 50 years ago the ideological gap between scribe and fan was quite this stark.

In any event, this is a large part of the reason why outlets like ESPN have lost viewers. No one is serving half the number of sports fans in the country, and many of those fans are simply walking away from their once fervent love of sports because of it.

Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston or email the author at igcolonel@hotmail.com.

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POLL: Only 4% of Sports Media Support Donald Trump - Breitbart News

The Splinternet

BothThe EconomistandWIREDare worried about the splinternet. The UK research organisation NESTAthinks it couldbreak up the world wide web as we know it.

What is this awkwardly named idea? Its the concept that someones experience of the internet in Turkey, for example, is increasingly different from their experience of the internet in Australia.

Travellers to China, in particular, will be familiar with this phenomenon. Thanks to the governments tight control, they have to use Baidu rather than Google as their search engine, and are unable to access Facebook or news sites like The Economist and the New York Times.

We have a growing splinternet because of regional content blocking and the need for companies to comply with diverse, often conflicting national policies, regulations and court decisions.

This tension is particularly apparent when it comes to the likes of Google, Facebook and Twitter. These platform companies have users in almost every country, and governments are increasingly insisting that they comply with local laws and cultural norms when it comes to access and content.

The idea of the internet as an independent, global and unregulated platform has always been something of a fiction. Even at the height oftechno-futurist rhetoricabout its potential to transcend national boundaries in the late 1990s, there were always exceptions.

The Chinese Communist Party understood from the start that the internet was simply a new form of media, and media control was central to national sovereignty and its authority.

But the splinternet refers to a broader tendency to use laws and regulatory powers within territorial jurisdictions to set limits on digital activities.

A threshold moment was Edward Snowdens revelations in 2013. The documents he shared suggested that the US National Security Agency, through itsPRISM program, had been collecting information from global users of Google, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft and Yahoo.

In countries suchBrazil, whose leaders had had their communications intercepted, this accelerated moves towards developing national internet control.

BrazilsMarco Civil da Internetlaw, for instance, now requires global companies to comply with Brazilian laws around data protection.

Until now, much of the appeal of the internet has been that its driven by user content and preferences, and not by governments.

But people are paying more attention to hate speech, targeted online abuse, extremism, fake news and other toxic aspects of online culture. Women, people of colour and members of certain religions are disproportionately targeted online.

Academics such asTarleton Gillespieand public figures such asStephen Fryare part of a growing rejection of the typical response of platform providers: that they are just technology companies intermediaries and cannot involve themselves in regulating speech.

AUK House of Commons reportinto hate crime and its violent consequences noted that:

there is a great deal of evidence that these platforms are being used to spread hate, abuse and extremism. That trend continues to grow at an alarming rate but it remains unchecked and, even where it is illegal, largely unpoliced.

If we say online hate speech should be policed, two obvious questions arise: who would do it and on what grounds?

At present, content on the major platforms is largely managed by the companies themselves. The GuardiansFacebook Filesrevealed both the extent and limitations of such moderation.

We may see governments become increasingly willing to step in, further fragmenting the user experience.

There are other concerns at play in the splinternet. One is the question of equity between technology companies and traditional media.

Brands like Google, Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, Netflix and Amazon areeclipsingtraditional media giants. Yet film, television, newspapers and magazines are still subject to considerably greater levels of country-specific regulation and public scrutiny.

For example, Australian commercial television networks must comply with locally produced material and childrens contentregulations. These mostly do not apply to YouTube or Netflix despite audiences and advertisers migrating to these providers.

It is increasingly apparent tomedia policy makersthat existing regulations arent meaningful unless they extend into the online space.

In Australia, the 2012Convergence Reviewsought to address this. It recommended that media regulations should apply to Content Service Enterprises that met a particular size threshold, rather than basing the rules on the platform that carries the content.

We may be heading towards a splinternet unless new global rules can be set. They must combine the benefits of openness with the desire to ensure that online platforms operate in the public interest.

Yet if platform providers are forced to navigate a complex network of national laws and regulations, we risk losing the seamless interconnectedness of online communication.

The burden of finding a solution rests not only on governments and regulators, but on the platforms themselves.

Their legitimacy in the eyes of users is tied up with what Bank of England chair Mark Carney has termed for markets is a social licence to operate.

Although Google, Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix and others operate globally, they need to be aware that the public expects them to be a force for social good locally.

See the rest here:
The 'Splinternet' May Be the Future of the Web - Futurism

The Australian Public Service Commission (APSC) has unwittingly unleashed a wave of debate about the amount of control employers have and should have over what their workforce posts on social media.

It released a statement updating its Code of Conduct around the usage of social media, and major media outlets were quick to publicise the apparent point that employees could be held liable for comments that other people write on their social pages.

Doing nothing about objectionable material that someone else has posted on your page can reasonably be seen in some circumstances as your endorsement of that material, the statement read.

If someone does post material of this kind, it may be sensible to delete it or make it plain that you dont agree with it or support it. Any breach of the code would not come from the person making the post. It would come from how you reacted to it.

The statement also says that posting negative comments about a current employer or member of Parliament is also generally a no-no, and that including a statement saying that such views are solely your own wont always protect you from a finding that you have breached the code.

It comes after a Brisbane law firm warned that social media posts are increasingly being used as part of compensation and employment matters.

Trent Johnson and Michael Coates of Bennett & Philp Lawyers identified a number of areas where social media is now being recognised, including the disclosure of sensitive business information, defamation, harassment and even false or misleading advertising, if social media posts are contradictory to what is claimed elsewhere.

Do you have policies or restrictions in place around what employees can post online? Have you experienced negative impacts as a result of your workers' use of social media? Tell us below or at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

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Public service unleashes spat on social media controls - My Business

Mitch Fifield: We want to see strong media organisations. And part of that is strong newsrooms continuing to employ journalists. Photograph: Mick Tsikas/AAP

The communications minister, Mitch Fifield, has signalled he will consider introducing a new tax break for smaller publishers to encourage them to employ more journalists, as part of the governments long-running deliberations on media reform, which could wrap up within the week.

Fifield is now in talks with both the Nick Xenophon Team and the Greens to see if the government can pass its media reforms, which have been deadlocked for months, largely because One Nation has refused to support the package as it stands.

The Greens are a recent entry to the talks with the government and, along with the NXT, are pursuing policy measures favourable to smaller, independent publishers as a mechanism to boost diversity.

The Greens have long opposed scrapping the two out of three rule, which would mean media moguls could control television, newspapers and radio stations in the same market but the party is now signalling it could consider that change if the government will countenance safeguards to encourage quality independent journalism.

As well as scrapping the two out of three rule, the governments package also includes scrapping the 75% reach rule, which prevents Nine Entertainment, Seven West Media and the Ten Network from owning their regional affiliates, due to restrictions on a TV network broadcasting to more than 75% of the population.

Fifield was asked on the ABC whether he would support measures being pursued by the Greens and the NXT, including tax breaks for small publishers.

The minister said he was happy to hear proposals to improve the viability of Australian newsrooms. We want to see strong media organisations. And part of that is strong newsrooms continuing to employ journalists.

Thats part of the basis of our media reform package, that youve got media organisations that are more viable, that can configure themselves in ways that support their viability.

The government has been forced to deal with the crossbench, because Labor is strongly opposed to scrapping the two out of three rule on the basis that it would make Australias media market even more concentrated than it already is.

Australias media market is one of the most concentrated markets in terms of ownership in the developed world.

The talks have been deadlocked despite assiduous lobbying by Australias major media companies because the Greens have been disinclined to negotiate until very recently, and because One Nation has been seeking as part of its wish list a reduction in the ABCs funding, which the government has seemed reluctant to deliver.

The progressive thinktank the Australia Institute took out full-page advertisements on Wednesday calling on the Coalition and all crossbench senators to rule out trading away ABC and SBS funding or independence as part of the current negotiations on the media package, which are now moving towards crunch point.

The ABC should not be used as a bargaining chip to progress a political agenda, said the executive director of the Australia Institute, Ben Oquist. One Nation accusations against the ABC have ranged from cultural Marxism to abandoning patriotism. Revelations this week show that the ABC is part of closed-door negotiations between the government and the crossbench.

It would be concerning if the Turnbull government was willing to put the independence and funding of a treasured national institution on the table in order to progress a deal on media reform.

While the Greens have been cautious in their public comments, other Senate players think a deal to pass the package could be concluded by late this week, or early next week.

Fifield was asked on Tuesday whether he was prepared to cut funding for the ABC in order to fund other remote and regional radio services, or agree to a spending review of the public broadcasters in return for One Nations support for the package.

The minister said the government had not yet entered any agreements with the crossbench and he said the government had already laid out the ABCs triennial funding in the 2016 budget.

That wasnt altered in the last budget, thats the fact, Fifield said. But I think its important to acknowledge the work that Michelle Guthrie has done within the ABC where shes created a new content fund and part of the purpose of that is to employ more regional journalists. And I think thats great.

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Coalition will consider tax breaks for small publishers in media reform deal - The Guardian

White House chief of staff John Kelly has already begun to impose order and structure on President Trump's occasionally chaotic team, but his authority has not yet extended to one of the most unruly aspects of Trump's presidency: @realDonaldTrump.

Trump gave Kelly unchecked hiring and firing power over White House aides below the senior counselor level when he chose the former homeland security secretary to replace outgoing chief of staff Reince Priebus late last month. Only a handful of top advisers including Jared Kushner, Ivanka Trump, Kellyanne Conway, and chief strategist Steve Bannon were exempted from Kelly's reach by requiring Trump's permission to remove or reassign, a source close to the White House said.

But while the president has offered Kelly a level of control Priebus never managed to obtain, Trump has resisted giving his new chief of staff veto power over the spontaneous and provocative tweets that often serve as a distraction for his administration.

A series of news reports suggesting Kelly had sought oversight of Trump's Twitter account, including a report that claimed Kelly wanted to know in advance what the president planned to post, made their way to Trump's desk last week, a person familiar with the situation told the Washington Examiner.

Trump "was pissed when he read Kelly wanted to control his Twitter feed," the person said.

Kelly has had luck in other areas. Trump's "Presidential News Summary," a collection of press clips presented to him by his staff, "is even more tightly controlled" under Kelly, the person noted. Beyond what he views on cable news, which is more difficult for his staff to police, Trump sees even less of the alternative right-wing news outlets than he did when Priebus and outgoing press secretary Sean Spicer oversaw the Presidential News Summary, the source said.

And Kelly has cracked down on who can share information with the president, even regulating Trump's contact with his own Cabinet secretaries.

"While sending a memo to the president is now largely impossible, even print-outs of news stories are not permissible," the source explained. "Cabinet members have been told not to call or send any memos to the president and that they must now communicate only through Kelly."

But while Kelly controls more of the inputs that reach Trump, he is less in control of Trump's Twitter output. Trump flexed his muscles Monday with a flurry of tweets criticizing major news organizations, blasting "fake news" stories and taunting Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut by inviting him to "take a nice long vacation in Vietnam."

The Twitter rampage stoked speculation that Kelly has not yet consolidated control of Trump's social media habits, even as he gains greater authority over other aspects of the White House's operation.

Kelly did approve national security adviser H.R. McMaster's request last week to fire an intelligence aide with close ties to Bannon, a move that ruffled feathers among Trump's populist supporters. A senior administration official told the Washington Examiner that the termination had nothing to do with the aide's political allegiances and instead resulted from "inappropriate" behavior.

The decision exposed an ideological rift in the West Wing between Bannon and McMaster that several sources said had simmered for months before Kelly's arrival. At least in these areas, people see Kelly making improvements.

Priebus suffered criticism from inside and outside the White House over his inability to control who had contact with Trump and his failure to police internal feuds over influence and access. Although the former Republican National Committee chairman found himself at the center of speculation that he would soon leave his chief of staff position since the early days of Trump's presidency, Priebus remained at the top of the White House staff hierarchy for six months.

Now, White House aides hope that Kelly will instill a sense of order in the West Wing after a period of upheaval that saw several high-profile departures, including Spicer, former White House communications director Mike Dubke and his short-lived successor, Anthony Scaramucci.

"The internal White House dynamics are becoming clearer," said one person close to the administration. "People aren't distracted with Priebus' ineptitude anymore."

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Trump clings to control of his Twitter feed as John Kelly consolidates authority - Washington Examiner