The Integrity Project
Join KPNX 12News anchor Mark Curtis, media executive and former publisher of The Arizona Republic Mi-Ai Parrish, and distinguished author and University of WisconsinMadison professor emeritus Lewis Friedland at 1 p.m., Friday, Sept. 27, for an important and thoughtful discussion of America's growing public information void – Water in a News Desert: The Reinvention of Local News – broadcast live online and presented by The Integrity Project and the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University.

Register for this free event at TIPAZ.org. The virtual panel discussion begins at 1 p.m. MST / 4 p.m. EST Sept. 27. Attendees may also submit questions for the panel on the registration website.

WHAT IS A NEWS DESERT?
Media watchers coined the phrase “news desert” as a term to describe a community that lacks access to reliable and comprehensive news coverage following the closure of thousands of media outlets in the early 2000s and 2010s – mostly newspapers. The primary news-gathering organization for a town or geographic area for generations was lost, along with the editors, reporters and photographers who chronicled life in the area and held the powerful accountable.

“In the most abbreviated terms, we're essentially seeing the fallout of news-gathering contraction and consolidation brought on by changes to the news business since the introduction and broad adoption of the Internet in the mid-1990s and social media soon thereafter,” says Mi-Ai Parrish, the Executive Director of Media Enterprise at Arizona State University. “But through innovation and what we're calling a 'reinvention' of local news, there is hope. We will serve those voids and slake consumers' thirst for reliable news and information in the news deserts. Our First Amendment will survive.”

More than 1,300 communities in the U.S. are classified as news deserts. Some shuttered newspapers consolidated with others or moved their news organizations online. But not all rural areas have access to high-speed, and what news there is becomes subject to alternative narratives, conspiracy theories, and social media misinformation.

“Mis- and disinformation has become one of the defining challenges of our lifetime,” says Scott Brooks, the Executive Director at The Integrity Project. “The information vacuum created by the departure and diminishment of these news gathering organizations has allowed special interest to move in which can spread misinformation and consumers becoming less engaged with civic life.”

The Integrity Project brings together a panel of leading experts in the field, who will speak to the challenge of news deserts and the initiatives currently underway to revitalize community news in the affected areas:

The Integrity Project is an apolitical 501c3 non-profit that seeks to uphold the standards of communication supporting a healthy, functioning society through education and research efforts. TIP maintains an online catalog of academic research projects, white papers, books and resources on misinformation and disinformation.  For more, visit our website - TIPAZ.org 

To register for Water in a News Desert: The Reinvention of Local News, CLICK HERE.