Hopefully, by the time you read this, the war in the Middle East will be over.
Early talk of the mission being virtually accomplished in the first hour of bombing was wildly premature and the US government quickly started to take its frustration out on the media.
Governments like to control messaging at the best of times and even more so in the worst of times.
Advanced democracies, like the US, have checks and balances that protect the press and freedom of expression, but these are currently under intense strain.
The government, especially the Pentagon and the Federal Communications Commission, is putting considerable pressure on the media to cover the war in a way that reflects well on its decision to go to war and the way the war is being prosecuted, not something which any credible news media outlet should be prepared to do.
That pressure is showing itself in a number of ways, including:
- limiting access for serious news organisations in press briefings and instead giving their places to, and prioritising questions from, compliant “news” outlets
- angry criticism of news media for asking probing questions
- threats to remove the licenses from news media that are not deemed to be reporting the war in a sufficiently “patriotic” manner
News media’s role is to establish and report the facts, however inconvenient these might be.
Encouragingly, there has been some pushback from the judiciary. In March, a federal judge voided various parts of a restrictive press policy rolled out by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth last year.
However, Hegseth reportedly plans to appeal the ruling so the fight to protect press freedom in the States continues.
Of course, it should be noted that however disappointing and concerning current attacks on press freedom in America are, it’s nothing compared to the repression journalists experience in Iran. In the 2025 World Press Freedom Index, the US ranked #57 and Iran #176 (Israel ranked #112, the UK #20 and Norway #1).
On a different subject, do check out our ‘subscriber retention special’.
There are some excellent contributions from leading publishers and suppliers. For me, three aspects of subscriber retention particularly stood out.
Firstly, its importance! It’s considerably more expensive to acquire a new subscriber than retain an existing one, so publishers need to allocate resources accordingly. Secondly, engagement is key. If your editorial team is not producing the content subscribers want, then the best retention team in the world won’t be able to get them to renew. Thirdly, involuntary churn is a big deal. Unless you have good systems in place, the chances are you are losing subscribers who would otherwise likely renew.
A date for your diary: on Tuesday, 12th May at 2.30pm (BST), we are holding a ‘Subscriber Retention Special – Q&A’ webinar in which the contributors to the special feature will be available to answer your questions. So, please enjoy the feature and register for the webinar so you can put your questions to them.
This article was first published in InPublishing magazine. If you would like to be added to the free mailing list to receive the magazine, please register here.
