NPR pulled out of Twitter after a spat with Elon Musk who called the public broadcast network “a government affiliate” and “implying” that it was “not editorially independent.”
- NPR’s Twitter account has gone down at 52 after the social platform added the black flag of “state media” to the brand’s official account last week.
- On Wednesday, she announced that she had “stepped away from Twitter” because the platform had “showed an interest in undermining our credibility.”
- It also noted that it received just less than 1 percent of its $300 million budget from the federally funded Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
National Public Radio (NPR) will no longer be active on Twitter after the social platform “undermined the credibility” of a news source when it described it as a “government-funded” outlet.
52 NPR’s Twitter account went silent after the social platform added the black sticker tag of “state media” to the brand’s official account — a tag often only seen associated with propaganda outlets in Russia and China.
It has since been changed to “Government Funded Media”. BBC and PBS also got the same mark.
NPR noted condition that the company receives less than one percent of its $300 million budget through the federally funded Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
In its recent tweets, the company connected other social media platforms, including FacebookShe posted a link with the headline: “NPR leaves Twitter after being falsely labeled ‘state media’.”
“We do not place our journalism on platforms that have shown an interest in undermining our credibility and the public’s understanding of our editorial independence,” the company wrote in a statement.
NPR CEO John Lansing (pictured) suspended all 52 official NPR Twitter accounts a week after the social platform called it ‘state media’.
It has since been changed to “Government Funded Media”. BBC and PBS have the same label
“We do not place our journalism on platforms that have shown an interest in undermining our credibility and the public’s understanding of our editorial independence,” the company wrote in a statement.
“We’re moving away from Twitter but not our fans and our communities.”
NPR is boarding its Twitter pages to protect its credibility, according to NPR President and CEO John Lansing.
“I will not let our content go anywhere that might jeopardize our credibility,” he said in the article. At this point, I had lost faith in Twitter’s decision-making. It will take me a while to understand if Twitter can be trusted again.
Last week, Lansing slammed Twitter on his own, writing: “NPR stands for freedom of speech[and]accountability for the powerful… We were upset when we saw last night that Twitter called NPR ‘state media,'” A description that, according to Twitter’s own guidelines, is not applicable to NPR.
He continued, “NPR stations and our members are supported by the millions of listeners who rely on us for the independent, fact-based journalism we provide.” It is unacceptable for Twitter to describe us in this way. A strong and vibrant free press is essential to the health of our democracy.
For NPR journalists, Lansing allows them to decide if they want to continue promoting their work on Twitter, but he said in an email to staff that it would be “a swipe at the hard work you all do here to keep sharing it.” On a platform that binds the Federal Charter to Public Media by giving up editorial independence or standards.
