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The White House is adding four ‘Skype Seats’ to its press briefings
- taserian 10y agoWhy use the "Skype" branding? Why not call them simply "video feed seats"?
- ozmbie 10y agoThe White House Press Briefing, brought to you by Skype and McDonalds!
- TeMPOraL 10y agoEvery day brings us closer to the Corporate Congress from the Continuum series. ;).
- drspacemonkey 10y agoOr the 29th amendment from Incorporated. Basically, imagine a show that takes place in the dystopian future of Continuum.
- TeMPOraL 10y agoSomehow I missed that show. Thanks, adding to my to-watch-while-eating-supper list :).
- ams6110 10y agoPeople know what Skype is. It's almost generic, like referring to tissues as Kleenex.
- pacomerh 10y agoDoes this mean Skype won the video conf battle already?
- droithomme 10y agoHis statement suggests they lost a trademark war.
- mrpippy 10y agoOr like calling all of GNU/Linux "bash" (yes Microsoft, that's you)
- ionforce 10y agoThis is another opportunity to hide the physicality of the room. The Skype members probably won't have the same viewpoint that reporters in the room will have. Easier to spin noises in the background.
- beedogs 10y agoImpeachment can't happen quickly enough.
- lolsal 10y agoIn relation to this submission - why?
- jorblumesea 10y agoSo basically, mainstream media is asking us annoying questions so we'll field them from people we like. Bets on how many of these Skype seats go to alt-right platforms and blogs? Bets on how often questions are fielded to these participants vs traditional media?
- droithomme 10y agoThis is pretty cool news to be sure. About time we had an administration in line with modern tech reality.
- tptacek 10y agoWhite House reporters aren't in the room because they lack the tech-savvy to be there; the New York Times can throw down against any Y Combinator startup in building technology. Reporters are in the room because they're trained, professional reporters who have dedicated their careers to reporting on the White House. Diluting their influence is not necessarily a good thing.
- jcranmer 10y agoThe White House's press room is actually a rather small room, and there are only 49 chairs in the room. You can see some of the pictures at Wikipedia and from links thereof (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_S._Brady_Press_Briefing_Room https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_S._Brady_Press_Briefing_...). One thing that is worth pointing out is that the chairs are all assigned seating to specific news organizations. This assignment is NOT done by the White House but the White House Correspondents' Association. So the Trump administration can't decide to, say, replace the Christian Science Monitor's or Al Jazeera's seat with Breitbart News. The linked article doesn't discuss who is going to be allocating these virtual seats--and I rather suspect that it's going to be decided by the White House and not the White House Correspondents' Association. It's disappointing that the article doesn't mention this, since knowing the answer to this question is what really sets the purpose of the move. If it is to be given to the White House Correspondents' Association, then it is likely an attempt to give voice to a wider range of media... but if it's White House-controlled, then it's more likely an attempt to guide press briefings to only considering questions from more compliant news organizations. Edit: There are 49 seats, not the 42 that I originally stated.
- loafa 10y agoNot a bad idea. The White House Press Corps is a small, insular, incestuous organisation. Opening questions to people outside the building could lead to something new.
- res0nat0r 10y agoBased on the current MO so far it will probably be to sites like Brietbart or other propaganda nonsense that the Trump team will have planted to call on.
- tptacek 10y ago"The White House Press Corps" is every major news reporting organization in the country both in print and broadcast. It's not a "small organization".
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- XaspR8d 10y agoUnder another administration I would be hopeful, but the Trump administration appears openly interested in choosing organizations that only ask the kind of questions they want to answer.
- makomk 10y agoTraditionally, the White House press corps was not exactly famed for its willingness to ask uncomfortable questions.
- Alupis 10y ago> Under another administration I would be hopeful, but the Trump administration appears openly interested in choosing organizations that only ask the kind of questions they want to answer How about we wait and see before passing judgement. After all... this is brand new, and obviously done under the new administration.
- microDude 10y agoOk, so Breitbart has a seat now. Who else?
- chomp 10y agoWell Steve Bannon already works for the White House, so Breitbart can have a seat already. I'm guessing less credible "fake-ish news" news sources that paint the administration in a positive light (but don't have press credentials) will have those seats.
- dougmany 10y agoMy first thought was that they were trying to get around those pesky fact checking media and serve "The Message" directly to the masses.
- tptacek 10y agoSeveral Internet-only sites are already members of the White House Press Corps, including hyper-conservative sites like Newsmax and the Daily Caller. Breitbart could have a seat in the briefing room if it wanted, and can certainly afford to do so.
- losvedir 10y agoIs the White House press briefing not televised/streamed already? Or is this just for the question asking aspect of it?
- nickff 10y agoThis gives people who are not from the major newspapers, magazines and TV stations access to ask questions at the briefing. Many of the majors don't even attend most briefings, so this could give more minor outlets much better access at low cost.