According to TheNationalReview:
Washington Post reporter Taylor Lorenz is facing scrutiny for allegedly lying in a recent piece about whether she had requested comment from two YouTube personalities who she accused of monetarily exploiting the Johnny Depp-Amber Heard trial.
In a story published Thursday, Lorenz, who recently gained notoriety for exposing the identity of the anti-woke Libs of TikTok Twitter account, claimed that a handful of “content creators” capitalized on the Hollywood actors’ courtroom drama to bolster their followings and revenue streams.
“The trial offered a potential glimpse into our future media ecosystem, where content creators serve as the personalities breaking news to an increasing numbers of viewers — and, in turn, define the online narrative around major events. Those creators can also bring in major personal profits in the process,” Lorenz wrote. “In this new landscape, every big news event becomes an opportunity to amass followers, money and clout. And the Depp-Heard trial showed how the creator-driven news ecosystem can influence public opinion based on platform incentives.”
Two social media figures whom Lorenz targeted, “LegalBytes” host Alyte Mazeika and an anonymous user named ThatUmbrellaGuy, say that that she never asked them for comment, even though she said she did in the piece. In the story, Lorenz said that “Mazeika and ThatUmbrellaGuy did not respond to requests for comment.”
“I can confirm that she did not reach out to me at all until I called her out on Twitter. After I did, she reached out to me by Twitter DM, providing her phone number for me to call her at some time. She never attempted to make an appointment or to facilitate a specific time to talk about the article,” Mazeika told National Review.
“Additionally, and I think importantly, she also left out the name of my channel and the fact that I’m an attorney. If she had included the name of my channel, it would have been clear that it isn’t so out of character for me to cover something like the Depp v. Heard trial, because I cover lawsuits and trials all the time,” Mazeika added.
Lorenz cited the reporting of Business Insider, which said Mazeika “earned $5,000 in one week by pivoting the content on her YouTube channel to nonstop trial coverage and analysis.” The columnist also alleged that ThatUmbrellaGuy “earned up to $80,000 last month, according to an estimate by social analytics firm Social Blade.”
