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Connecting
May 17, 2024
Click here for sound of the Teletype
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Molly Gordy described this photo of her husband Richard Drew and Elton John as “two 77-year-old with bad knees, shmoozing.” Photo by Burhan Ozbilici/AP
Colleagues,
Good Friday morning on this May 17, 2024,
Sir Richard, meet Sir Elton.
Well, our AP colleague Richard Drew is not knighted like the famed singer Elton John, but they did meet on stage in London on Wednesday night for the private viewing of 300 photographs from the collection of John and David Furnish.
Richard’s wife Molly Gordy was there, and brings us our lead story that includes several AP mentions including Burhan Ozbilici, who took the sequence of photos of the 2017 assassination of the Russian ambassador to Turkey; AP war correspondent Fisnik Abrashi...and although he was not there, his photo was - John Filo, who was a student (later AP photographer) who took the iconic picture from the 1970 Kent State war protests that claimed four students' lives.
Richard’s photo of The Falling Man from 9/11 was the only one of the photos that John mentioned, and he said it was his favorite from among the 7,000 photos in his collection.
Congratulations to our colleague Joyce Rosenberg – who culminated four years of classes and thesis writing to earn her Doctor of Ministry degree from Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in New York. She tells about that journey in today’s issue.
For your information:
KEN KUSMER SERVICES: For those AP colleagues who may want to participate remotely, Ken's service on Saturday at 11 a.m. will be live-streamed. Click here for the link. Click here for his obituary. (Shared by Jodi Perras)
ARNOLD ZEITLIN SERVICES: A celebration of life is scheduled this Saturday at 10 am Eastern for our colleague Arnold Stanley Zeitlin, who died last Dec. 26 at the age of 91. Click this link to join the webinar. Passcode: 824487
BEN BROWN CONDOLENCES: Condolences may be sent to the Brown family, 1803 Rambouillet Road, Paso Robles, CA 93446. Memorials preferred to Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, 1156 15th St. NW, Suite 1020, Washington, DC 20005.
Here’s to a great weekend – be safe, stay healthy, live each day to your fullest.
Paul
A magical, mystical evening in London
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Richard visiting with one of Elton John's friends. Photo by Burhan Ozbilici/AP.
Molly Gordy – Wednesday night, Richard and I slipped through the looking glass for a magical, mystical evening at London's Victoria and Albert Museum.
We came to London for a private viewing of Fragile Beauty, an exhibition opening Saturday of 300 photographs from the collection of Elton John and David Furnish that includes The Falling Man. "Private" turned out to be something of a misnomer, as 1,000 of the glitterati turned out to drink champagne and hear Sir Elton speak. Of course, since I am married to a photojournalist we were among the first in line (or should I say, "queue").
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Burhan Ozbilici in front of his photo of the assassination of the Russian ambassador. Photo by Richard Drew/AP
GIFT OF FATE PART I: A handsome gent resembling the actor Anthony Quinn approached us, having spotted Richard's lapel pin, and asked if he was a photographer. "Yes, and I have a photo in the exhibit," Richard said. "Me too," said the guy: "Where do you work?" "Associated Press," Richard said. "Me too," said the guy. And it was Burhan Ozbilici, who took the legendary sequence of photos of the 2017 assassination of the Russian ambassador to Turkey! And the first thing he asks us is, of course: "Do you know @Edith Lederer?" followed by a hilarious anecdote of their adventures in Egypt.
GIFT OF FATE PART II: Sir Elton speaks to the throng, and of the 300 photos, mentions only The Falling Man, saying it is the favorite of his 7,000 acquisitions, and that he chose the title of the exhibition, "Fragile Beauty," from the feeling it evokes in him. Richard yells from the crowd, "I'm here!" and the organizers pull him onto the stage where Sir Elton says, "Thank you, Sir, thank you!" and gives him a long bear hug.
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A visitor studying John Filo’s iconic Kent State picture. Photo by Fisnik Abrashi.
GIFT OF FATE III: We proceed to the show, which spans, like, 10 rooms, arranged by category. And when we enter the room with Burham's and Richard's photos, we see that Julio Cortez' famous flag-burning photo is also part of the show and added to the V&A permanent collection! So Julio, we are so sorry you were unaware and hope you will cross the pond in the next three months to see your work on magnificent display.
People are milling around, including several of fluid gender in magnificent garb who are FOE (friends of Elton), and then a man introduces himself, and it's AP war correspondent Fisnik Abrashi! He was only there by accident because his wife Jemima went to Uni(versity) with a V&A curator, and is bowled over by the coincidence. His first question was of course, "Do you know @Kathy Gannon?" This led to Afghanistan anecdotes and our account of the fabulous @Anja Niedringhaus retrospective that Kathy has co-curated with Bernadette Tuazon. Afterwards we all went to dinner at Tapas Brindisi, an outstanding place suggested by our friend Chiara Coletti. It was an evening for the ages!
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The Associated Press covered the show and moved this story by Jill Lawless under the headline: “Glamour and grit are both on show in a London exhibition of photos from Elton John’s collection”.
It began:
LONDON (AP) — A new exhibition of photographs owned by Elton John is everything one might expect from a star who has a fascination with image, a love of excess and a very large budget. Understated, it isn’t.
The show, opening this week at London’s Victoria and Albert Museum, includes more than 300 pieces by 140 photographers selected from the vast collection of John and his husband David Furnish.
Covering the period from 1950 to the present day, they include iconic fashion shots by Irving Penn, Richard Avedon and Herb Ritts, portraits of stars including The Beatles, Frank Sinatra Marilyn Monroe and Chet Baker, and photojournalism capturing moments in history, from the Black civil rights movement of the 1960s to 1980s AIDS activism and the Sept. 11 attacks.
And it included:
Many of the greats from seven decades of photography are represented, from Diane Arbus, Eve Arnold, Bruce Davidson and Robert Franck to Wolfgang Tillmans, Cindy Sherman and Ai Weiwei. There are several works by Associated Press photographers, including Richard Drew’s haunting “Falling Man” image from 9/11 and Julio Cortez’s 2020 photo of a protester with an upside-down American flag amid unrest in Minneapolis.
A four-year journey ends in Doctor of Ministry degree
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Joyce receiving her degree, and afterward she is surrounded by her stepchildren, whose father was AP journalist Marty Sutphin, and three of her grandchildren, plus their partners.
Joyce Rosenberg - On May 2, I received my Doctor of Ministry degree from Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in New York. It was the culmination of four years of classes and thesis writing, and an accomplishment that I never could have imagined for myself until a mentor suggested it in January 2020.
My thesis, which was 325 pages, was more about psychoanalysis than theology although they were inseparable in some ways. I surveyed psychoanalysts about whether and how they explore God, faith, religion and spirituality with their patients against the backdrop of Freud's well-known and influential excoriation of religion.
I started this degree while I was in my last year at AP, taking vacation days on Mondays so I could go to class. Now I'm in an interesting position: For the first time in 64 years, I have neither an employer nor a school making demands on my time and brain cells. But there is no rest for the weary; the results of my research need to be published, so I'm beginning work on the first of what I hope will be several psychoanalytic journal articles. And I continue to see patients five days a week.
My 46 years in journalism came in handy as I wrote my thesis. It helped to be a writer and to love the process of researching and digging for facts and sources. And my advisors were thrilled that they didn't have to edit what I wrote.
Many journalists have asked me how I came to be a psychoanalyst. In college I was torn between journalism and social work, and journalism won out when I got a job at WINS Radio in New York. But in the mid 1990s, when I felt something was missing in my life, I began analytic training.
If I had been born into a very different Jewish family, I might have become a rabbi. This degree is as close as I'll get, and that's quite fine.
Sue Cross, Trailblazer Of Nonprofit News Movement, Named To Block Club Chicago Board
CHICAGO — Sue Cross, the former CEO of the Institute for Nonprofit News and a trailblazer of the nonprofit news movement, has joined Block Club Chicago’s Board of Directors.
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An award-winning journalist and leading social entrepreneur, Cross advises journalists, philanthropists, investors and civic leaders on media development to save and reinvent public access to trusted journalism.
From 2015 to 2023, Cross led development of the U.S. nonprofit news sector as CEO and executive director of the Institute for Nonprofit News. Under her leadership, the INN Network grew from a few dozen newsrooms to nearly 500 news organizations supporting more than 4,000 journalists across North America, and funneling more than $13 million a year in philanthropy and investment to nonpartisan news outlets serving thousands of communities.
In her role at INN, Cross was also pivotal in Block Club Chicago’s founding, providing early strategic support to the newsroom. INN served as Block Club’s fiscal sponsor before it was granted 501(c)3 status from the IRS.
Read more here. Sue, a Connecting colleague, was a reporter, editor, bureau chief, regional vice president and senior vice president during her AP career.
Voice-cloning technology
Bruce Lowitt – Regarding the AP story, Voice-cloning technology bringing a key Supreme Court moment to ‘life’ - As long as we're at it, why not recreate Lincoln giving the Gettysburg Address, SojournerTruth's "Ain't I a Woman?", Patrick Henry's "Give me liberty or give me death", the Golden Speech by Elizabeth I, Attila at the battle of the Catalaunian Plains, Jesus' Sermon on the Mount ...
How long before AI and its "relatives" cause us to question the authenticity of anything and everything?
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Connecting wishes Happy Birthday | |
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Stories of interest
Lets Chill Out About Apostrophes (New York Times)
By John McWhorter
Opinion Writer
You’re reading the John McWhorter newsletter, for Times subscribers only. A Columbia University linguist explores how race and language shape our politics and culture. Get it in your inbox.
The North Yorkshire Council in England has been in the hot seat recently for its changes to street signs — not because of anything on them, but rather because of something left off. One street in the town of Harrogate was rendered as St. Marys Walk. No apostrophe. Outrage ensued.
The problem, punctilious observers argued, was that the nearby church is and always will be St. Mary’s — with an apostrophe, thank you very much — and leaving that bit of punctuation out of the name of the road obscures that vital and historical connection. Plus it’s just plain ignorant.
St. Marys Walk was just the beginning. It turns out the county plans to phase out apostrophes on all street signs, in part “to prevent complications while searching on databases,” an official told my Times colleague Jenny Gross.
The intensity of the debate may seem surprising. How many people would really miss the connection between St. Marys Walk and St. Mary’s Church? Language lives in, and on, context, and the context here is unmistakable. The truth is, apostrophes in general don’t make our language much clearer. We could really do without most of them.
Read more here. Shared by Shirley Christian.
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Susan Chira to Step Down as The Marshall Project’s Editor-in-Chief in January
Susan Chira will step down early next year as editor-in-chief of The Marshall Project, the award-winning nonprofit criminal justice newsroom that marks its 10th anniversary this fall.
During her tenure, The Marshall Project won numerous journalism accolades, more than doubled its staff and expanded into local communities stripped of resources to investigate criminal justice. The organization substantially diversified staff and leadership, launched its first hit podcasts and multi-episode video series, and deepened its commitment to reach the incarcerated and their families.
“Susan Chira has been a phenomenal editor-in-chief and a wonderful partner,” said Carroll Bogert, president of The Marshall Project. “She took an impressive young nonprofit start-up, and made it a substantial and well-respected player on the media scene.”
Read more here.
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The Cohen Complication (CNN Reliable Sources)
By OLIVER DARCY
The Donald Trump hush money trial is dragging reporters into uncomfortable territory and laying bare the complicated relationships journalists often have with sources.
Michael Cohen, who continued to testify Thursday, invoked from the stand the names of several high-profile media figures, putting their relationships with the former Trump fixer in the spotlight.
Cohen named The New York Times' Maggie Haberman and MSNBC's Katy Tur as reporters which he had established relationships with. He alleged without evidence that ABC News' John Santucci had tried to pay for the rights to Stormy Daniels' story. And he spoke about having recorded dozens of phone calls with media figures, including former CNN boss Jeff Zucker.
To be clear, a reporter having working relationships with sources is not unethical — it's often a hallmark of being a strong journalist and it does not translate into taking orders or publishing unvetted information. Reputable news outlets like ABC News do not pay for interviews, but trying to secure a sit-down with a high-profile subject is anything but uncommon. And speaking on the phone with a source while the person on the other end of the line secretly records says a lot more about that individual than the journalist.
Read more here.
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GANNETT STAFF FURIOUS OVER CONTRACT ALLOWING AI “TO GENERATE NEWS CONTENT” (Futurism)
By MAGGIE HARRISON DUPRÉ
Writers at the Democrat & Chronicle, a Rochester, New York daily newspaper owned by the American publishing giant Gannett, are outraged after discovering that their owner quietly updated contract language to allow seemingly unlimited use of AI in "news content," Digiday reports.
In early April, Digiday reports, Chronicle writers received a version of the employment contract that included very precise language regarding where and how AI could be used at the newspaper.
AI "may be used to generate news content that is supplementary to local news reporting," read the original clause, which the Newspaper Guild of Rochester has since claimed was settled language following contract negotiations, "and is not a replacement for it."
But later that month, when Chronicle writers received an updated draft, they discovered that this highly specific language had been whittled down to the bone. (Per Digiday, Chronicle journalists say they received no explicit notice from Gannett of the surprise change.)
AI "may be used to generate news content," read the new version.
Read more here. Shared by Doug Pizac.
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Meet AdVon, the AI-Powered Content Monster Infecting the Media Industry (Futurism)
By MAGGIE HARRISON DUPRÉ
A few years back, a writer in a developing country started doing contract work for a company called AdVon Commerce, getting a few pennies per word to write online product reviews.
But the writer — who like other AdVon sources interviewed for this story spoke on condition of anonymity — recalls that the gig's responsibilities soon shifted. Instead of writing, they were now tasked with polishing drafts generated using an AI system the company was developing, internally dubbed MEL.
"They started using AI for content generation," the former AdVon worker told us, "and paid even less than what they were paying before."
The former writer was asked to leave detailed notes on MEL's work — feedback they believe was used to fine-tune the AI which would eventually replace their role entirely.
The situation continued until MEL "got trained enough to write on its own," they said. "Soon after, we were released from our positions as writers."
Read more here. Shared by Doug Pizac.
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Today in History – May 17, 2024 |  | |
Today is Friday, May 17, the 138th day of 2024. There are 228 days left in the year.
Today’s Highlight in History:
On May 17, 1954, a unanimous U.S. Supreme Court handed down its Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka decision which held that racially segregated public schools were inherently unequal, and therefore unconstitutional.
On this date:
In 1536, Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer declared the marriage of England’s King Henry VIII to Anne Boleyn invalid after she failed to produce a male heir; Boleyn, already condemned for high treason, was executed two days later.
In 1940, the Nazis occupied Brussels, Belgium, during World War II.
In 1946, President Harry S. Truman seized control of the nation’s railroads, delaying — but not preventing — a threatened strike by engineers and trainmen.
In 1973, a special committee convened by the U.S. Senate began its televised hearings into the Watergate scandal.
In 1980, rioting that claimed 18 lives erupted in Miami’s Liberty City after an all-white jury in Tampa acquitted four former Miami police officers of fatally beating Black insurance executive Arthur McDuffie.
In 1987, 37 American sailors were killed when an Iraqi warplane attacked the U.S. Navy frigate Stark in the Persian Gulf. (Iraq apologized for the attack, calling it a mistake, and paid more than $27 million in compensation.)
In 1996, President Bill Clinton signed a measure requiring neighborhood notification when sex offenders move in. (“Megan’s Law,” as it’s known, was named for Megan Kanka, a 7-year-old New Jersey girl who was raped and murdered in 1994.)
In 2004, Massachusetts became the first state to allow same-sex marriages.
In 2010, the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that young people serving life prison terms should have “a meaningful opportunity to obtain release” provided they didn’t kill their victims.
In 2012, Donna Summer, the “Queen of Disco,” died at age 63.
In 2013, Jorge Rafael Videla (HOHR’-hay rah-fay-EHL’ vih-DAY’-lah), 87, the former dictator who took power in Argentina in a 1976 coup and led a military junta that killed thousands during a “dirty war” against alleged subversives, died in Buenos Aires while serving life in prison for crimes against humanity.
In 2015, a shootout erupted between bikers and police outside a restaurant in Waco, Texas, leaving nine of the bikers dead and 20 people injured.
In 2017, the Justice Department appointed former FBI Director Robert Mueller as a special counsel to oversee a federal investigation into potential coordination between Russia and the 2016 Donald Trump campaign.
In 2020, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo was tested for the coronavirus on live TV as he announced that all people in the state who were experiencing flu-like symptoms were eligible for tests.
Today’s Birthdays: Actor Peter Gerety is 84. Singer Taj Mahal is 82. Rock musician Bill Bruford is 75. TV personality Kathleen Sullivan is 71. Boxing Hall of Famer Sugar Ray Leonard is 68. Sports announcer Jim Nantz is 65. Producer Simon Fuller (TV: “American Idol”) is 64. Singer Enya is 63. Actor-comedian Craig Ferguson is 62. Rock singer-musician Page McConnell is 61. Actor David Eigenberg is 60. Singer-musician Trent Reznor (Nine Inch Nails) is 59. Actor Paige Turco is 59. Actor Hill Harper is 58. TV personality/interior designer Thom Filicia is 55. Singer Jordan Knight is 54. R&B singer Darnell Van Rensalier (Shai) is 54. U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo is 53. Actor Sasha Alexander is 51. Rock singer-musician Josh Homme (HAHM’-ee) is 51. Rock singer Andrea Corr (The Corrs) is 50. Actor Sendhil Ramamurthy (SEN’-dul rah-mah-MURTH’-ee) is 50. Actor Rochelle Aytes is 48. Singer/songwriter Kandi Burruss is 48. Actor Kat Foster is 46. Actor Ayda Field is 45. Actor Ginger Gonzaga is 41. Folk-rock singer/songwriter Passenger is 40. Dancer-choreographer Derek Hough is 39. Actor Tahj Mowry is 38. Actor Nikki Reed is 36. Singer Kree Harrison (TV: “American Idol”) is 34. Actor Leven Rambin is 34. Actor Samantha Browne-Walters is 33. Actor Justin Martin is 30.
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Connecting is a daily newsletter published Monday through Friday that reaches more than 1,800 retired and former Associated Press employees, present-day employees, and news industry and journalism school colleagues. It began in 2013. Past issues can be found by clicking Connecting Archive in the masthead. Its author, Paul Stevens, retired from the AP in 2009 after a 36-year career as a newsman in Albany and St. Louis, correspondent in Wichita, chief of bureau in Albuquerque, Indianapolis and Kansas City, and Central Region vice president based in Kansas City.
Got a story to share? A favorite memory of your AP days? Don't keep them to yourself. Share with your colleagues by sending to Ye Olde Connecting Editor. And don't forget to include photos!
Here are some suggestions:
- Connecting "selfies" - a word and photo self-profile of you and your career, and what you are doing today. Both for new members and those who have been with us a while.
- Second chapters - You finished a great career. Now tell us about your second (and third and fourth?) chapters of life.
- Spousal support - How your spouse helped in supporting your work during your AP career.
- My most unusual story - tell us about an unusual, off the wall story that you covered.
- "A silly mistake that you make"- a chance to 'fess up with a memorable mistake in your journalistic career.
- Multigenerational AP families - profiles of families whose service spanned two or more generations.
- Volunteering - benefit your colleagues by sharing volunteer stories - with ideas on such work they can do themselves.
- First job - How did you get your first job in journalism?
- Most unusual place a story assignment took you.
Paul Stevens
Editor, Connecting newsletter
paulstevens46@gmail.com
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