Yeah, throw a pile of money at a problem, build an old jalopy, and then name it after a tabloid: The Star. I know the Washington Star because I’ve had to read its old stories for my books, but let’s be honest: he wants a 1950s cosplay newsroom.

You have to wonder if billionaires are so sheltered and bored that they invent fake challenges just to burn money: “Hey, bitches, let’s see which one of us can resurrect journalism!” “I’m in!” “Yeah, me too!”

I have a better challenge: pay your fair share of taxes and act like obedient middle-class people for once. Show some solidarity with the people you fleeced with your previous products and services. You made your money; you’re done. Buy a rhodium crown, a stylin’ cape, some diamond-encrusted shoes and go play golf somewhere. It would actually be less cringe than this PR “mission.”

You are not going to resurrect a dead profession. You’re not special.

It’s not a money problem. It’s a structure and relevance problem, and with AI, the future of getting the news is in inputs and processes—not in legacy names and billionaire mascots. Real journalism in an AI era means showing your inputs, methods, and machine checks so people can see how the story was built, not just who’s posing on the masthead.

We’ve already seen what the last “innovation” from this orbit produced: horse-race, gossip-page politics that graded power on vibes, not outcomes. That wasn’t “saving journalism,” it was turning it into a handicapping service for insiders.

To appropriate and rework an old Dave Broadfoot line: in Hollywood, they roll out the red carpet; in journalism, they roll out the name tags.

That star faded a long time ago, and the Washington Star died for a reason. It’s not the 1950s anymore. Move on.

And you can tell this is a kissy fluff piece by the way it starts with “color,” exactly the kind of narrative sugar that helped speed journalism toward the cliff. Retire it, dearies. Like I said, it’s not the 1950s, it’s the post-myth era, and the act is tired.

What I mean by “AI, inputs, and processes”
When I say AI is the future of how we get news, I don’t mean handing the keys to a black box and calling it a day. I mean systems where you can actually see the pipeline: which sources were pulled, how claims were checked, what an algorithm did, and where a human editor stepped in. That is where AI is useful, as a glorified audit trail and pattern detector, if, and only if, newsrooms are forced to be transparent about how they use it.
In other words, the question shouldn’t be “Is this brand-name billionaire funding the newsroom?” but “Can I see the receipts on how this story was made, including the machines?” If you can’t see the process, you’re not getting journalism, you’re getting content marketing with a nostalgia filter.