Newhouse School Announces Finalists in 2017 Mirror Awards Competition

The Newhouse School today announced the finalists in the 2017 Mirror Awards competition honoring excellence in media industry reporting. Winners will be announced at an awards ceremony June 13 in New York City.

The finalists, selected by a group of journalists and journalism educators, are:

Best Single Article/Story

• “The secret rules of the internet” by Soraya Chemaly and Catherine Buni (The Verge)
• “How to Spin the Science News” by Charles Seife (Scientific American)
• “The Outrage Machine” by Bonnie Bertram and the Retro Report team (Retro Report)

Best Profile

• “A light in the underworld” by Sarah Esther Maslin (Columbia Journalism Review)
• “Hard Pressed: Will the Boston Herald Survive?” by Chris Sweeney (Boston magazine)
• “Thrashed” by Willy Staley (The California Sunday Magazine)
• “The Disturbing Decline of Sumner Redstone” by Peter Elkind with Marty Jones (Fortune): Part 1, Part 2, Part 3

Best Commentary

• “How Journalists Can Help Hold Scientists Accountable” by Michael Schulson (Pacific Standard)
• “How False Equivalence Is Distorting the 2016 Election Coverage” by Eric Alterman (The Nation)
• David Zurawik (Baltimore Sun)
  • “Trump a master media manipulator in his prime”
  • “Biggest loser of 2016 presidential election? The media”
  • “Trump masters media in a manner surpassing JFK”
• James Wolcott (Vanity Fair)
  • “So, Like, Why Are We So Obsessed with Podcasts Right Now?”
  • “Helen Gurley Brown, Terry McDonell, and the Glossy Glory Days of Magazines”
  • “Donald Trump Has Totally Upended Conservative Media, and it’s Beautiful”

John M. Higgins Award for Best In-Depth/Enterprise Reporting

• Laura Sydell, Robert Smith, Luke Vander Ploeg (NPR/Planet Money)
  • “Finding the Fake-News King”
  • “We Tracked Down A Fake-News Creator In The Suburbs. Here’s What We Learned”
• Ryan Mac, Matt Drange (Forbes)
  • “This Silicon Valley Billionaire Has Been Secretly Funding Hulk Hogan’s Lawsuits Against Gawker”
  • “Behind Peter Thiel’s Plan To Destroy Gawker”
  • “Hulk Hogan’s Lawyers Have Made Suing Gawker Their ‘Bread And Butter’”
• Gabriel Sherman (New York magazine)
  • “The Revenge of Roger’s Angels”
  • “Former Fox News Booker Says She Was Sexually Harassed and ‘Psychologically Tortured’ by Roger Ailes for More Than 20 Years”
  • “Sources: Megyn Kelly Told Murdoch Investigators That Roger Ailes Sexually Harassed Her”
• Craig Silverman and the BuzzFeed News team (BuzzFeed News)
  • “Hyperpartisan Facebook Pages Are Publishing False And Misleading Information At An Alarming Rate”
  • “How Teens In The Balkans Are Duping Trump Supporters With Fake News”
  • “This Analysis Shows How Viral Fake Election News Stories Outperformed Real News On Facebook”
  • “Most Americans Who See Fake News Believe It, New Survey Says”
  • “These 6 Easy Steps Will Help You Spot Fake News Every Time”

The Mirror Awards are the most important awards for recognizing excellence in media industry reporting. Established by the Newhouse School in 2006, the awards honor the reporters, editors and teams of writers who hold a mirror to their own industry for the public’s benefit.

In addition to the juried awards, the Newhouse School will present the Fred Dressler Leadership Award and the i-3 award for impact, innovation and influence at the award ceremony, which will be held Tuesday, June 13, from 11:30 a.m. to 2:15 p.m. at Cipriani 42nd Street, 110 E. 42nd St., New York City. Tickets and tables may be purchased online. Follow on Twitter at #Mirrors17.

For information about ticket and table sales for the ceremony, contact Amanda Griffin at 315.443.7982 or algri100@syr.edu.