Media Bits and Bytes — February 17, 2026
- Big Tech’s Takeover of State Power
- End DHS Subpoenas for Personal Media
- Bad Bunny and Mainstream Culture
- Pre-Post Mortem for the Post
- Risks of Age Verification for Social Media Use
- Talk: The Right Turns on Bondi
- Goodbye, CBS News
- Women Warn About Hollywood Bro Culture
- David Brooks Takes a Bow
- Q and A for the Good FCC Commissioner
Big Tech’s Takeover of State Power
By Francesca Bria, Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung
Under Donald Trump’s second administration, a new formation has crystallized in Washington: a coalition of tech billionaires, venture capitalists, and ideologues engineering what we call the “Authoritarian Stack” — a vertically integrated system of privatized control extending from cloud platforms and AI models to autonomous drones, military satellites, and even monetary infrastructure.
End DHS Subpoenas for Personal Media
By F. Mario Trujillo, Electronic Frontier Foundation
In the past year, DHS has consistently targeted people engaged in First Amendment activity. Among other things, the agency has issued subpoenas to technology companies to unmask or locate people who have documented ICE’s activities in their community, criticized the government, or attended protests. These subpoenas are unlawful, and the government knows it.
Bad Bunny and Mainstream Culture
By Niela Orr, London Review of Books
Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl half-time show was a magic trick that revealed what those who refer to other people as ‘illegal aliens’ would prefer to keep hidden or otherwise misrepresented: the contributions made by people of colour to America’s national story.
Pre-Post Mortem for the Post
• The Post Dies in Broad Daylight By Jonathan V. Last, The Bulwark (Scroll down to “2. The Post”)
• Bezos Blues By Tina Brown, Fresh Hell
• Society Without Watchdogs By Brian Karem, Salon
• Book World is Dead, Too By Becca Rothfeld, The New Yorker
• News is Not Safe Any More By Jane Martinson, The Guardian
Risks of Age Verification for Social Media Use
By Jelinda Montes, Salon
Social media apps like Instagram and TikTok have long come under fire for potential harms to children and teens using their platforms. A first-of-a-kind lawsuit against Meta and Google, parent companies of Instagram and Youtube, began trial in Los Angeles Feb. 9, with the plaintiff’s attorney claiming the apps have “engineered addiction in children’s brains.”
Talk: The Right Turns on Bondi
By Noah Dowe, Media Matters for America
As fallout from the Trump administration’s handling of the Jeffrey Epstein case continues to grow, right-wing media have set the sights of their blame on Attorney General Pam Bondi. Some figures are now insisting Bondi “is not to be trusted” and “should be fired or resign,” after pinning the blame on her for “the biggest fumble of the Trump administration.”
• Heterodox Journalism By Pocharapon Neammanee, Huffpost
• Anderson Cooper Takes a Powder By Brian Steinberg, Variety
Women Warn About Hollywood Bro Culture
By Dr. Martha M. Lauzen, Women’s Media Center
It’s no secret that tech companies have incubated and fostered a bro culture since their inception. Women’s representation as filmmakers has barely budged over the last quarter century. Women have never topped 25% of those working in key behind-the-scenes roles since the annual Celluloid Ceiling study began collecting data in 1998.
By Raina Lipsitz, FAIR
Throughout his decades at the New York Times, Brooks has defended the powerful, denigrated the vulnerable, and decried America’s toxic political culture, the causes of which he has analyzed via tossed-off listicles. Brooks has served as an apologist for the ruling class, whose crimes and errors of judgement he is always ready to trivialize and forgive.
Q and A for the Good FCC Commissioner
By Craig Aaron, Free Press
Anna Gomez, the FCC’s lone Democratic commissioner, got the job because of her deep subject-matter expertise. But under the Trump regime, the assignment has changed. Trump FCC Chairman Brendan Carr has pushed the agency into the middle of the culture wars: launching bogus investigations into news content, attacking diversity programs.