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Latest comment: 2 years ago12 comments9 people in discussion
The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Pink-slime journalism → Pink slime journalism – The name itself is a pejorative that derives from pink slime, which doesn't have a hyphen. As a result, the vast majority of sources that I see don't appear to have the hyphen in it. These include all of the sources cited currently in the article that use "pink slime journalism" or some variant phrase, as well as others listed below:
It seems to be an intentional choice to use the hyphen in the lead (the article creator created a redirect to the hyphenated version), so I don't expect this to be uncontroversial. However, I believe that the article title should be changed to be without a hyphen, along the vein of WP:COMMONNAME. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 17:37, 14 November 2021 (UTC) — Relisting.SkyWarrior02:06, 22 November 2021 (UTC)Reply
Further comment: Please note that without the hyphen, one could read this as being about slime journalism with a particular color. More properly, the color belongs to the slime, not to the journalism. — BarrelProof (talk) 15:32, 15 November 2021 (UTC)Reply
Oppose – adjectival phrases that modify nouns should be hyphenated, per MOS:HYPHEN and the desire for more precise titles when possible. I don't see WP:COMMONNAME as being particularly relevant: we as a project have made a stylistic determination that compound modifiers should generally be hyphenated, so sources that don't follow that convention have little bearing on the appropriate title for this article. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 06:29, 29 November 2021 (UTC)Reply
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Latest comment: 1 year ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Hadn't come across this article before. First thing that struck me, in addition to its overlap with e.g. astroturfing, is the conspicuous "left and right" at the top. We appear to cite several articles about this phenomenon's connection to conservative talking points, but the one source that specifically talks about the left is an opinion column in Newsweek, which shouldn't actually be carrying any WP:WEIGHT and appears to create a WP:FALSEBALANCE. However, we do also cite a Fortune article which mentions a connection to the left, so I'm holding off on making an edit until getting some other opinions here. — Rhododendritestalk \\ 22:20, 14 March 2023 (UTC)Reply
In 2020, Open Secrets wrote about "political operations...pouring millions of 'dark money' dollars into ads and digital content masquerading as news coverage to influence the 2020 election." They mention a couple of examples. "One newer group heralding the new era of pseudo-news outlets is ACRONYM, a liberal dark money group with an affiliated super PAC called PACRONYM." and "Websites affiliated with Courier Newsroom that appear to be free-standing local news outlets are actually part of a coordinated effort with deep ties to Democractic political operatives." I've seen those two places mentioned (frequently) as the primary examples of this from left-of-center operations. Metric Media is usually mentioned as the right-of-center operation. However, there's another distinction to be drawn. An operation can be doing what Open Secrets claims ACRONYM and Courier News are doing, but not do it in a pink-slimeish way. In other words, there's a distinction between being a pseudo-news outfit or trying to appear to be an independent newsrooms when you actually aren't and committing pink slime. Pink slime journalism isn't the only way to be a pseudo-news outfit. Novellasyes (talk) 12:43, 15 March 2023 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 1 year ago2 comments2 people in discussion
What are the defining characteristics of pink-slime journalism? According to the current two opening sentences, the defining characteristics are:
It is journalism published on a news outlet that exists for this purpose ("dedicated")
It is poor-quality
It is made to appear to be local news
It is perpetrated by Republican groups and corporate public relations firms
The goal is to "push right-wing agendas" and also to "gather user data".
The reports are either computer-generated or written by poorly-paid outsourced writers, often using fake names
Pink-slime journalism involves outsourcing local news stories to low-wage employees, or using computer automation to generate news stories from various datasets.
There's a lot going on there! I'd propose:
Deleting 1. I don't see why this type of journalism has to be appear on a website devoted to this type of journalism to qualify as pink slime.
I'm good with 2 (poor quality)
Deleting #3. I don't see how bringing in a local news angle is definitional for pink slime. You could have pink slime style/quality articles about national or state issues.
Deleting 4. It could be that more pink slime at the present time is coming out from Republicans or corporate shills but as we point out later in the article, there's at least one Democratic group doing it. This establishes that it can come from either side of the aisle and, in fact, even without that, pink slime journalism at its essence doesn't even have to be about politics.
Deleting 5. Not if there are also Democratic practitioners as has been said to be the case.
I agree with 6. That seems to be definitionally characteristic of pink slime
I agree somewhat with 7 (I don't agree with it being about just local news) -- low wage employees and the use of computer automation to generate news from various datasets seems very characteristic. Novellasyes (talk) 20:50, 31 March 2023 (UTC)Reply
I've made some tweaks to the lead sentence to change it to Pink-slime journalism is a practice in which news outlets publish poor-quality news reports which appear to be local news, often to push right-wing agendas and gather user data. I agree that it had gotten somewhat bloated. It should summarize the article, though, and I think the local news portion and the "often to push right-wing agendas" both well reflect the existing article text. GorillaWarfare (she/her • talk) 23:07, 31 March 2023 (UTC)Reply
