NPC Update-1 Podcast

The movie House of Gucci is off to an impressive start at the box office, taking in more than $33 million in North America in the two weeks since its release. It's based on a book written by Sara Gay Forden, the guest on the latest Update-1 podcast. Forden talks with Broadcast Podcast team member Gemma Puglisi about the challenges of writing her book, "The House of Gucci: A Sensational Story of Murder, Madness, Glamour, and Greed." Forden recounts living in Italy and covering the Italian fashion industry and how Maurizio Gucci, the grandson of the company's founder who was brutally murdered in 1995, drew her to "write the story." She also discusses how her book became a movie, the excitement of meeting members of the cast and the need for good content.

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David Ensor spent three decades as a news correspondent for NPR, ABC, and CNN then turned to public service with a year at the U.S. Embassy in Afghanistan and then four years as director of the Voice of America. Among his overseas posts was that of ABC News Bureau Chief in Warsaw, when a Polish cleric became pope and helped his native land turn away from Communism. On this edition of Update-1, Ensor comments on all three of those experiences which remain in the news--the rightward turn of the current Polish government, the end of America's "forever war" in Afghanistan, and the efforts of the last administration to refashion the Voice of America, He spoke with Press Club Broadcast Podcast team member Irv Chapman.

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The National Capital Radio and Television Museum (https://ncrtv.org/), located just east of the Capital Beltway in Bowie, Maryland, opened its doors in 1999 and contains an impressive collection of radio and television equipment, some roughly a century old. In this edition of Update-1, NPC Broadcast/Podcast Co-vice Chair Adam Konowe interviews museum curator Brian Belanger about the genesis of the museum, who it attracts and why it has earned five-star status on TripAdvisor. Belanger highlights a number of the museum’s most noteworthy artifacts, as well as other educational features of the museum, such as its comprehensive library and hands-on technology classes.

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American journalist Danny Fenster has been imprisoned in Myanmar since May, while Chinese journalist Haze Fan has been detained in China since December. Fenster and Fan are the NPC’s most recent John Aubuchon Press Freedom Award winners.   

In this edition of Update-1, Broadcast Podcast team member Lincoln Smith interviews veteran reporter and long-time Press Club member John Donnelly, who discusses the two Press Club honorees and another detained journalist, Austin Tice. Donnelly also highlights his own career and offers thoughts on the state of press freedom around the world.

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The National Press Club’s 22nd annual photo exhibit is on display in the Club’s lobby and virtually at https://technewslit.com/npc/photoex2021/index.html. In this edition of Update-1, broadcast/podcast co-vice chair Adam Konowe spoke with photo team co-chair Alan Kotok about the exhibit in a time of ongoing pandemic and social unrest. Konowe also interviewed two photographers whose work is part of this year’s exhibit. Arizona-based new member Ben Sarao submitted four panoramic nature images, while the work of long-standing member Aretha Williams from Washington D.C. mostly benefitted from painstaking retouching, colorizing and other editing techniques.

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Russian independent journalists have faced increased government pressure ahead of the country's parliamentary election this Sunday. In some cases that has meant Russian police raiding their homes and seizing cellphones, laptops and tablets. This is widely seen as an attempt by President Vladimir Putin to cement his rule before the 2024 presidential election.

In this edition of Update-1, Broadcast Podcast Committee member Irv Chapman talks with Michael Smeltzer, a Russian analyst at Freedom House, about the state of press freedom in Russia. They discuss how Putin quickly gained control of the broadcast media within a few years after becoming president and what the impact has been of the Russian government designating some news organizations and journalists as "foreign agents" leading up to this month's election. 

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How reliable was the intelligence the U.S. received as it planned its withdrawal from Afghanistan? And what is the future of Afghanistan after the U.S. and its allies pull out? Those are some of the issues covered in this edition of Update-1.

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Increasing audiences for network news, cable television news, online radio and podcasts, a revenue decline for all-news radio stations and a circulation decline for newspapers. Those are just a few of the findings in this year's State of the Media report by the Pew Research Center. In this edition of Update-1, NPC Board of Governors member Debra Silimeo talks to Katerina Eva Matsa, the associate director of journalism research at Pew, about the key findings in the 2021 report.  Among the issues they discuss are the role that TV plays in news coverage, the change that occurred in newspaper revenue and an employment shift within the journalism industry.

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"People want and need our journalism more than ever." That's how the President and CEO of News Media Alliance, David Chavern, describes the current state of the newspaper industry. The NMA previously was the Newspaper Association of America. It's the news industry's largest trade organization, representing about 2,000 publishers in the United States. In an Update-1 interview with Broadcast Podcast member Gemma Puglisi, Chavern talks about the record number of readers last year as local news became vitally important during the coronavirus pandemic. He also discusses how digital editions are allowing newspapers to reach subscribers well beyond their geographic boundaries, and explains the challenges of monetization and distribution. 

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The International Federation of Journalists says 65 journalists and media workers were killed worldwide last year while doing their jobs. The killings occurred in 16 different countries during targeted attacks, bomb attacks and crossfire incidents. In this edition of Update-1, Broadcast Podcast team member Lincoln Smith talks with IFJ General Secretary Anthony Bellanger about the ongoing global challenges to press freedom. Bellanger discusses the deaths and imprisonment of journalists in Asia, Africa and Europe, summarizes the IFJ mission, and compares and contrasts the current-day freedom of the press with that of 50 years ago.

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