Forward

Hey there! Welcome to the Reliable Sources newsletter, and congrats on making it to Friday. This is Oliver Darcy, filling in again for Brian Stelter. If you have feedback or a tip, shoot me an email or find me on Twitter. Now, let's get to the news...

What will trigger the culture warriors on Sunday?

It's Super Bowl weekend, with the New England Patriots facing off against the Los Angeles Rams. Once upon a time, the big game would unite the country as tens of millions of people tuned in to watch football, commercials, and the halftime show. But things have changed in recent years. The Information Wars have politicized nearly every cultural phenomenon, putting them front and center in the middle of a raging conflict that pits Americans against each other.

And while this season has been relatively tame in this vein compared to the last, the NFL has at times found itself smack-dab at the center of this struggle. So what will Sunday bring? That's unclear right now, of course. But come Monday, I'm sure the culture warriors on "Fox & Friends" will have seized on something. Whether it will be a commercial, part of the halftime show, or something else, only time will tell...

Trump uses the pre-game interview to attack Pelosi

If you were holding out hope that Trump would use his pre-Super Bowl interview with CBS News to unite the country, think again. Speaking to "Face the Nation" host Margaret Brennan, Trump lashed out at Nancy Pelosi, calling her "very bad for our country" and saying, baselessly, that "you have people dying all over the country" because of her refusal to fund a border wall.

And that's only the excerpt CBS News released Friday evening. There's a lot more to come... A CBS source told me the interview, which covered a wide array of topics, was originally slated for 30 minutes, and ran 15 minutes over. Sarah Sanders actually held up the arrival of Marine One so the interview could continue, the source said... Afterward, Trump chatted with the CBS crew and took some pictures... More of the interview will air on "Face the Nation" Sunday morning, and then ahead of the Super Bowl at 3:30 p.m.

The future of Super Bowl ads is...not on TV?

Over at WIRED, Emma Grey Ellis published a piece about the state of the Super Bowl commercial. "Running an ad during the Super Bowl used to be pinnacle of American marketing prestige, but in an age when Super Bowl viewership is slipping and even avid watchers are splitting their attention between the game and the conversation about the game on social media, appealing to the internet has become more important than crafting a sizzling 30-second TV spot," Ellis wrote. Her piece is worth the read...

...That's not to say brands aren't still spending big on conventional ads

CBS has nearly sold out its inventory for Super Bowl commercials, Variety's Brian Steinberg reported on Friday. A 30-second spot with some digital components was being sold for north of $5 million, per Variety...

Look out for WaPo in the fourth quarter

During the fourth quarter of Sunday's big game, WaPo will debut its first Super Bowl spot ever. Narrated by Tom Hanks, the 60-second ad will display scenes throughout history, from World War II until today, describing the role journalists play in society, and the dangers they face. More info here...

>> From Fred Ryan's memo to staff: "We feel that this is the right moment, at the right venue, to present this important message to the large audience of Americans and international viewers that watch the Super Bowl..."

The Super Bowl proves TV is still king

Daniella Emanuel emails: The Athletic's Richard Deitsch, Adweek's Sara Jerde and Sports Business Journal's John Ourand joined Brian Stelter on the "Reliable Sources" podcast to preview this year's Super Bowl broadcast. They discussed how, in the age of streaming, the Super Bowl proves that TV is still king... Listen on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, or TuneIn...

FOR THE RECORD, PART ONE, SUPER BOWL EDITION

-- Frank Pallotta emails: Tony Romo is calling his first Super Bowl this weekend, but he isn't nervous about it. "The game calls itself," Romo told me recently... (CNN)

-- Pallotta emails another one: The Super Bowl is TV's biggest spectacle of the year. And that is in large part due to one game 50 years ago: Super Bowl III... (CNN)

-- Vulture's Larry Fitzmaurice writes, "Why Maroon 5's Super Bowl Halftime Show Is Already a Mess..." (Vulture)

-- Sandra Gonzalez looks at "what makes a celebrity endorsement a touchdown..." (CNN)

-- Want to binge on Super Bowl commercials? AdAge has put all the ads that have been released so far in one spot... (AdAge)

-- Quartz has a story revealing "the secret to betting on the Super Bowl..." (Quartz)

-- Don't know much about the big game? ABC has you covered with a primer on the basics... (ABC)

-- Tom Kludt put together a nice piece on why Rams owner Stan Kroenke is facing a rebellion in England... (CNN)

-- Some people are apparently convinced that a "SpongeBob" Super Bowl Tribute will happen during the halftime show... (CNN)

Virginia governor pictured in racist photo

Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam is facing a political crisis after it was revealed he was in a racist 1984 yearbook photo showing one person dressed in blackface and another in the KKK's signature white hood and robes. The photo was first published Friday afternoon by Big League Politics, a far-right website founded by former Breitbart and Daily Caller staffer Patrick Howley. At first, there was some caution about the photo, but other news outlets soon verified its authenticity.

By Friday evening, Northam had confirmed he was in the photo and apologized, saying he is "deeply sorry for the decision I made to appear as I did in this photo and for the hurt that decision caused then and now." He later uploaded a video apology online. But it's hard to imagine that those apologies alone, if anything, will be enough to quell this growing firestorm... CNN.com has the latest here...

More grim news in media with layoffs at Vice and buyouts at McClatchy

Tom Kludt emails: The Media Massacre of 2019 resumed on Friday, with two grim announcements surfacing before noon. First came the news that Vice Media would be undergoing a "global restructure" that will result in 250 layoffs, or about a 10% reduction of its workforce. Then came the news out of McClatchy, where CEO Craig Forman informed staff that 10% of them would be offered voluntary buyouts.

Those cuts mark a continuation of what's been a truly awful start to the year for the news media industry – and the dual announcement from Vice and McClatchy made for a lousy parallel to last week's layoffs that hit both digital shops (BuzzFeed, HuffPost) and traditional news organizations (Gannett)...

>> Related: Over at NYT, Edmund Lee offers up a postmortem to the BuzzFeed layoffs, and at NiemanLab, the headline of Ken Doctor's latest says "Amid screaming alarms, consolidation mania turns feverish..."

Snopes severs fact-checking partnership with Facebook

Snopes on Friday afternoon dropped a surprise announcement. The fact-checking website said in a statement that it had, after two years, "elected not to renew our partnership with Facebook."

Why had Snopes made this decision? The statement wasn't very specific, but said that Snopes was "evaluating the ramifications and costs of providing third-party fact-checking services" and wanted to "determine with certainty that our efforts to aid any particular platform are a net positive for our online community, publication, and staff." I checked in with a Facebook spokesperson to see if the company had any comment, but did not hear back...

This Sunday on "Reliable Sources..."

Brian Stelter emails: On this Sunday's "Reliable" I'll be joined by David Zurawik, Jackie Kucinich, Howard Dean, Juana Summers, and David Folkenflik... Plus Kimberly Ross and Andrea Ruth, the two RedState contributors who publicly resigned this week... See you Sunday at 11 a.m. ET!

FOR THE RECORD, PART TWO

-- The Newseum is closing its doors in January 2020 and "shrinking into an uncertain future." So how did it arrive at this point? After all, it had a "dazzling start that gave no hint of the dizzying fall to come..." (WaPo)

-- The Washington Examiner fired two reporters on Friday, in a move that sources told BI's Joe Perticone was aimed at taking the website in a more Trump-friendly direction... (Business Insider)

-- RedState has deleted a post critical of the two staffers who resigned this week... (Mediaite)

-- Snap is bringing back its "Yellow" content incubator. It previously invested $1.35 million in the first iteration of the program last year... (Variety)

Sulzberger confronts Trump on press freedom

A.G. Sulzberger was silent throughout most of Thursday's NYT interview with Trump. But as the interview came to a conclusion, the NYT publisher spoke up. "Mr. President, before we wind down, I didn't want to miss the opportunity just to raise a concern that we discussed last time I was here," Sulzberger said, sparking a discussion that became the basis for Friday's edition of "The Daily."

Sulzberger explained that he was concerned about Trump's continued attacks on the press, telling the president that since he last warned him on the issue, "We've started to see some of those consequences play out." To make his point, Sulzberger pointed to the "unprecedented rise in attacks on journalists, threats to journalists, censorship of journalists, jailing of journalists and murders of journalists" taking place around the world.

Trump: I've noticed more people declaring "fake news," but not my fault!

Trump responded, saying that he had noticed that "people are declaring more and more fake news" and that he had "even seen it in other countries." But Trump stopped short of taking responsibility. "I don't necessarily attribute that to me," Trump said. Continuing to address the topic of a global crackdown on journalists, Trump added, "I don't like that. I mean I don't like that." But then he shifted the topic to himself, saying, "I don't like, though I do think it's very bad for a country when the news is not accurately portrayed...And I do believe I'm a victim of that, honestly."

>> Sulzberger later told Michael Barbaro that he "certainly wasn't expecting the full back and forth" on the topic with the president...

"It was a very human moment"

There was one part of the back and forth between Sulzberger and Trump that stood out. Trump, talking to Sulzberger, was genuinely upset about the coverage he had received from what he affectionally referred to as his hometown newspaper. "I came from Jamaica, Queens, Jamaica Estates and I became president of the United States. I'm sort of entitled to a great story from my -- just one -- from my newspaper," Trump said.

Speaking to Barbaro, Sulzberger said, "It was a very human moment. And it seemed like a very sincere moment." Sulzberger said he didn't buy Trump's premise that Trump hasn't had a positive story in The Times, and noted that Trump is "a disruptive political figure who has an incredibly divisive approach to governing." Sulzberger concluded that "the coverage has reflected that."

>> I strongly recommend you listen to the full conversation Sulzberger had with Trump, and read the excerpts... NYT also published a behind the scenes look at how Barbaro got Sulzberger to stay in DC to record "The Daily..."

FOR THE RECORD, PART THREE

By Daniella Emanuel:

-- Last week, the Telegraph apologized for and pulled their January 19th cover story on Melania Trump's life, after the first lady claimed she was defamed. Now the journalist who wrote it is threatening to sue the British publication...(BuzzFeed News)

-- A Twitter bug is causing users to see retweets on their timeline from people they don't follow...(TechCrunch)

Spotify to buy Gimlet?

Big news for the podcasting world. WSJ's Ben Mullin and Anne Steele reported that Spotify is in talks to purchase Gimlet Media. The news was also reported by Recode's Peter Kafka, who said it would represent "one of the biggest acquisitions in the still-nascent podcasting industry."

Graydon Carter's next act

Get ready to subscribe to yet another newsletter. Former Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter is teaming up with Alessandra Stanley to launch Air Mail, a newsletter aimed at keeping cosmopolitans "up to speed on the latest fads, fashions, arts, riots, scandals, and political upheavals in Europe and Asia," NYT's Alex Williams reported. The newsletter will launch this summer, and hit inboxes on Saturdays at 6 a.m.

>> Of note: Carter told The Times the newsletter will not touch on domestic politics, explaining it will be "designed to live in a Trump-free world..."

Booker's media rollout

Cory Booker on Friday became the latest Democratic presidential hopeful to announce his candidacy. The New Jersey senator chose the first day of Black History Month to make the announcement, doing so in the form of a YouTube video embargoed for 7 a.m. From there, he did an interview on the "Tom Joyner Morning Show" and one on "The View," and delivered a speech outside his home in Newark.

Booker, as CNN's Rebecca Buck noted in her story, "joins a crowded and growing Democratic field that is already the most diverse in history -- with multiple women, one gay candidate, a Latino and, with Booker now in the mix, two black candidates." Full coverage here...

FOR THE RECORD, PART FOUR

-- Chuck Todd opened his Friday show by looking at what he called a "Trump alternate reality camera" to call out Trump on the border wall... (Mediaite)

-- CJR publishes former BuzzFeed News reporter Emily Tamkin's "diary of a laid off reporter..." (CJR)

-- A Media Matters analysis finds that Fox News' primetime shows have mentioned Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez over four times more than Mitch McConnell this year... (Media Matters)

Judge to Stone: Stop treating this "like a book tour"

Roger Stone was back in court on Friday afternoon... and the federal judge overseeing his case cautioned Stone to stop treating the lead up to trial "like a book tour." Stone, of course, has been busy since his arrest last Friday. He's done multiple television interviews, appeared on radio, and pretty much talked to anyone who has pointed a camera in his direction.

It seems the judge has had enough of it. "This is a criminal proceeding and not a public relations campaign," Judge Amy Berman Jackson said on Friday, urging Stone against arguing his case "on the talk circuit." It will be interesting to see if Stone heeds any of the judge's advice...

Attention Bloomberg employees

If you work at Bloomberg, you now have a convenient way to score a copy of founder (and possible 2020 presidential candidate) Michael Bloomberg's book, "Bloomberg by Bloomberg." According to a report by Politico's Daniel Lippman, a new internal function on the terminal was added for employees to order free copies for themselves, or clients/sources...

By Lisa Respers France:

-- Jussie Smollett has broken his silence after his reported attack...

-- Want to save some green by going more green? Go vegan and you could win Beyoncé concert tickets for life...

-- "Sex Education" has been renewed by Netflix for a second season...

Chris Albrecht steps down at Starz

Brian Lowry emails: Chris Albrecht is stepping down as CEO of Starz, a move that stems from the pay network's absorption by Lionsgate. The exit also comes amid what feels like a generational shift in the entertainment business, including Albrecht's former HBO colleague Jeff Bewkes leaving after the Time Warner-AT&T deal and the forced exit of Leslie Moonves from CBS. Albrecht breathed considerable life into Starz's original programming efforts, launching such shows as "Power" and "Outlander."

Gina Rodriguez and Maisie Williams move into movies

Lowry emails: Gina Rodriguez ("Jane the Virgin") and Maisie Williams ("Game of Thrones") both have starring movie vehicles premiering this weekend, in advance of their shows coming to an end this spring. Rodriguez headlines "Miss Bala," a remake of a 2011 Mexican film, while Williams plays a cancer-stricken girl who teachers a boy how to live in "Then Came You."

No clear frontrunner in lead up to the Oscars

Lowry emails one more: The Oscar picture remains blurry, but with "Roma" director Alfonso Cuarón as a heavy favorite, it likely won't come into much greater focus on Saturday, when the Directors Guild of America presents its annual awards. The Screen Actors Guild already lauded "Black Panther," the Producers Guild went with "Green Book," and the Writers Guild will present its awards on Feb. 17...

That concludes this edition of the newsletter. Brian will be back on Sunday. Until then, shoot me an email with your thoughts!