WHO DECIDES WHAT BECOMES NEWS? with Mic Wright

Keith Walsh sits down with journalist, author and media critic Mic Wright to talk about who really decides which stories become news — and which ones don't. Mic is the author of Breaking: How the Media Works, When It Doesn't, And Why It Matters, now out in paperback, and writes the media criticism newsletter Conquest of the Useless. The conversation begins with a surprising Irish connection: Alfred Harmsworth, the Dublin-born founder of the Daily Mail, and the man who helped transform popular journalism more than a century ago. From there, Keith and Mic explore how newspapers learned to capture mass attention, the political power of media owners, the relationship between journalists and politicians, bias and groupthink inside newsrooms — and what happens when the media simply gets a story wrong. And in an age when newspapers are competing with X, TikTok, YouTube and Facebook, have we really escaped the power of the old press barons — or have we simply replaced newspaper editors with algorithms? Keith Walsh in conversation with Mic Wright — author of Breaking: How the Media Works, When It Doesn't, And Why It Matters.