1/ The right-wing noise machine has a disorienting effect.

Flooding the zone with lies, hate, conspiracies and intimidation. It distorts the conversation, tilts media narrative toward their nonsense, fosters fear and anxiety.

But recognize: this moment unlike any in decades… 2/ I am not sugar coating things. But, I also want to share some major considerations that many aren’t aware of. Considerations as to why this moment is so very unique.

1/ I want to explain a bit about what this means. Project 2025 has 4 Pilars: Policy, Personnel, Training and Playbook.

Project 2025 is saying they will stop Policy work. This isn't very significant for 2 major reasons...

https://twitter.com/RebeccaARainey/status/1818367275646300383

2/ Project 2025 shutting down policy work isn't significant because: a) the bulk of the policy work is already done. The 900 page policy book is already written; and, b) the other 3 Project 2025 pilars remain in place -- especially the Playbook pilar.

1/ So this might partially help explain the delay: Last evening (4/16), Fox submitted a motion to the court. The motion asked the court to allow Fox to introduce as evidence that Donald Trump and others (Trump was the only one Fox named) made the same claims about others. 2/ A previous ruling said Fox wasn't really allowed to do this and they needed to keep focus on what they did. But, Fox is asking for the court to clarify and also approve this for 2 reasons (and this is kinda amusing)...

1/ There's something incredible in the background during this Dominion trial that is at least as significant (and possibly even more significant) as the trial itself for Fox News' bottom line.

My goodness is this a doozy... 2/ As the trial is happening, Fox News will be renegotiating or gearing up to renegotiate carriage renewal with 3 cable providers -- Xfinity, Chater and Cox.

It's hard to overstate how significant this and how potentially consequential this is for Fox News' future. Here's why...

1/ Judge issued ruling on the summary judgment motions in the Dominion v Fox News case.

Fox Corp and Fox News' motions for summary judgment to dismiss the case have been denied.

Domion's motion for summary judgment is granted in part and denied in part.

Details to follow... 2/ In its partial ruling in favor of Dominion, the court did determine statements made by Fox were statements of fact and were not statements of opinion.

1/Some Dems are really gonna throw Fox a life raft just as it’s drowning, huh?

If you’re Dem leader, regardless what you think, recognize you don’t need to go on in this moment.

Better off saying nothing than criticize Fox while confirming you’ll treat them same as always. 2/Recognize that “should Democrats go on Fox” debate is actually 2 distinct questions.

1) Should Democrats go on Fox?
2) Should Democrats go on Fox right now?

I can make strong case for both. But I feel like 2 is obvious. There is no valid reason for going on Fox right now.

1/ Given all the recent revelations about Fox News' internal machinations from the Dominion filings, I'd like to give a sense of just how delicate this moment is for Fox..

I'll start with advertisers, then talk about cable agreements and close with likely cascading litigation 2/ Advertisers. Fox News is already suffering with advertisers quite a bit. Yea, they have MyPillow and vegetable pill sponsors. But, overall, advertising isn'tas robust as it could be -- especially for prime time.

For ex, Fox is currently Fox News' 4th biggest advertiser. Weird

1/ There's a thing happening right now to Fox that is quite important and will almost certainly influence the trajectory of Fox News if the trend continues.

For some context, a while back, I posted a tread about Fox News and carriage fees.

https://twitter.com/GoAngelo/status/1244819790650322944

2/ The short of it is that Fox News is wildly over priced compared to other channels. So much so, that Fox News could have $0 dollars in advertising revenue and they would still have a 90% profit margin.

1/ Musk reinstating Trump's Twitter account in this moment has significant ramifications that are worth flagging for awareness and understanding... 2/ First, let's talk about Fox News and Donald Trump.

There is this percolating narrative out there that the Murdoch's/Fox News have turned on Trump. That's not really accurate or supported by evidence, but...there is definitely some distance between emerging.

1/ Tweet thread about Elon Musk/Twitter advertiser spaces discussion: 2/ I see Starz in there. My understanding was that Starz had paused their ads. So, we'll see after the meeting if anything changes there. 👀

1/ There is some pretty substantial context about Twitter's 2023 revenue and advertisers that I think partly help explains why Musk is really losing it...

And it involves upfront ad sales. Let me explain... 2/ Back Twitter (like a lot of digital companies) participates in an event called new fronts. At this event, they sell large chunks of ads for the following year.

Typically, Twitter sells like ~600-900M in ads at new fronts. That's guaranteed revenue for following year.

1/ Twitter changed my life. In 2009, I was a second year law student. Amassing massive amounts of debt. Drowning in dread from the mounting debt. Dreading the prospect of big law, which is where I was headed (no offense to big law folks). 2/ Then, I joined Twitter. At the time, I joined as StopBeck. My account was largely dedicated to getting advertisers to pull ads from Glenn Beck's Fox News show. It was great procrastination, but it also exposed me to advocacy and to media accountability.

1/ This is significant -->

Today, more than 40 organizations signed a letter to Twitter's major advertisers urging them to commit to pulling ads if Musk follows through with promises to roll back community safeguards and scale back content moderation.

businessinsider.com/civil-society-… 2/ It's a prodigious group.

Some signers: Free Press, NAACP, PFLAG, Union of Concerned Scientists, Public Citizen, Accountable Tech, Color of Change, United We Dream, NCTE, National Hispanic Media Coalition, GLAAD, Doctors in Politics, AAJC, UltraViolet, Media Matters...

See:

1/ Major Twitter advertisers and media buyers need to be putting pressure on Twitter right now. The lack of content moderation means that their ads will absolutely be appearing alongside the the worst stuff.

bloomberg.com/news/articles/… 2/ So let's assume these companies don't care at all about extremism or the fact that Musk disabling these tools on Twitter means that Twitter will be actively undermining the election (and their ads will be helping it).

They should care from a business and brand perspective.

1/ Seeing lots of talk about how absurd it is to pay Musk $20/month (or $5/month) for a verified blue check. Indeed! Sure is.

Apropos, it's worth noting that ~90 million cable customers pay Fox News around $2-2.50 every month regardless of whether they ever watch channel. 2/ Fox News is the second most expensive non-premium channel on every person's cable bill (ESPN is #1). And, it is precisely because they forced cable companies into overpaying for Fox News that Fox, unlike most commercial media outlets, doesn't really need advertisers.

1/ Thread about some of Twitter's major advertisers and a few observations or things these companies should probably be forced to explain... 2/ For starters, here are Twitter's current top 20 advertisers. Collectively, they have spent over $350M on Twitter ads so far this year.

mediamatters.org/twitter/these-…

1/ Musk's acquisition and subsequent running of Twitter will transform (for the worse) the current information landscape in much the same way that the emergence of Fox News changed the information landscape back in the late 90s. 2/ Fox News' "fair and balanced" slogan was tongue in cheek. They didn't mean that fox itself was balanced, what they meant was that they saw the rest of the media as too far left and Fox News there to balance it out.

1/ Caution: There is this emerging narrative that Fox News has somehow turned on Donald Trump. The media is seriously misreading this and also blowing a few things wildly out of proportion. Let me explain... 2/ Yes, it's true that Fox News is not as reflexively, loudly amplifying and boosting Trump the way they did when he was president. So people are right that ... yea .... things are a little different. But no, Fox News hasn't turned on Trump.

1/ Verizon is dropping One America News. Verizon was last major provider carrying OAN. DirecTV dropped them earlier this year.

Following DirecTV dropping them, OAN began to suffer financially pretty as evidenced by scaling by programming. Losing Verizon is final nail in coffin. 2/ It wasn't getting much attention in the press, but for the past few weeks (and months), Media Matters as well as some other advocates have been urging Verizon to follow DirecTV's course of action drop them.

1/ So, I just want to point something out about Sec. Buttigieg's answer on Fox News Sunday yesterday. The good one that is making the rounds today.

Yes, it was a good answer. But, I think what most people don't realize is what happens after an answer like that... 2/ First off, Fox News doesn't like play the answer on a loop all day long. So basically, Fox viewers don't actually see it. Instead what they do is they go on offense. This pattern *always* happens after a good segment with a Democrat.

1/ Elon Musk is terminating his attempted Twitter acquisition. A few thoughts… 2/ First, this is significant from a disinfo and extremism perspective. Musk had every intention of using Twitter for express political and ideological purposes. That is prevented now.

More here: thedailybeast.com/elon-musk-will…