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The media world over the last few week has been rocked by major disruptions: Fox ousts Tucker Carlson, CNN fires Don Lemon, BuzzFeed News is shutting down, Twitter has become a less reliable resource, and Vice Media shutters its flagship program “Vice News Tonight.” Over the last two decades, the media landscape has transformed with the advent of social media, and signs of another evolution are surfacing. This week on Deconstructed, Ryan Grim is joined by Ben Smith, the editor-in-chief of Semafor, to talk about his new book “Traffic: Genius, Rivalry, and Delusion in the Billion-Dollar Race to Go Viral.” They discuss the role social media played in transforming media and politics over the last 15 years, and how one of the most viral moments in history alarmed Facebook.

Transcript coming soon. 


This content originally appeared on The Intercept and was authored by Deconstructed.

Citations

[1] Elon Musk’s Twitter Widens Its Censorship of Modi’s Critics in India ➤ https://theintercept.com/2023/03/28/twitter-modi-india-punjab-amritpal-singh/[2] Deconstructed: Bonfire of the Twitterverse ➤ https://theintercept.com/2022/11/18/deconstructed-elon-musk-twitter/[3] Elon Musk Still Silencing Journalists He Banned From Twitter ➤ https://theintercept.com/2022/12/20/elon-musk-twitter-banned-journalists/[4] Covid Disinfo Doctor Wants to Help Elon Musk Fact-Check Twitter ➤ https://theintercept.com/2022/12/15/elon-musk-twitter-covid-vaccine-simone-gold/