The Desk has received a prestigious, accredited rating for its straightforward approach to reporting on the business and influence of the media industry.
Earlier this year, the media watchdog organization Media Bias/Fact Check (MBFC) rated The Desk as “least biased” and “highly factual” for its original reporting and analysis on various sectors of the media industry, including television broadcasting, streaming video, advertising and measurement, with reports spanning daily business updates and in-depth stories on policy and legal-related matters.
“Overall, we rate The Desk as least biased based on minimal editorializing of content. We also rate them as High for factual reporting due to proper sourcing and a clean fact-check record,” MBFC said in a statement published on their website.
On its Bias Rating scale, MBFC assigns a numerical score based on perceived bias of a news outlet’s reporting — the closer to zero, the better. A negative score reflects a tendency to report news with a center-left or progressive view, while a positive score reflects news reporting that is center-right or conservative. The Desk received a score of -0.5, putting in the “least biased” category on the Bias Rating scale.
“The Desk demonstrates minimal political or ideological bias in its coverage,” MBFC said. “Its reporting focuses narrowly on media industry developments and legal matters, with a clear, straightforward tone.”
MBFC said The Desk espouses a commitment to reporting on controversial matters with a straightforward approach. It called attention to an article that covered an appellate court decision of a legal matter involving the Associated Press and President Donald Trump as demonstrable proof of The Desk‘s approach to facts-first, unbiased reporting.
Similarly, MBFC said The Desk‘s reporting on the U.S. government’s decision to fire Voice of America workers and a business deal between SiriusXM and ESPN personality Stephen A. Smith demonstrated that The Desk covers news from a neutral point of view.
“Across reviewed articles, there is no use of emotionally loaded language or partisan framing,” the organization said.
The review was conducted in June by Dave Van Zandt, the founder of MBFC. The Desk was not involved in the review and does not pay for accreditation by third parties.
MBFC was founded in 2015 as an independent organization that aims to raise awareness of media bias and misinformation by ranking news websites and outlets based on bias, factual accuracy and credibility.
The Desk is owned by Solano Media, LLC and is based in Northern California. Last year, The Desk was the most-engaged publication on LinkedIn when evaluated against similarly-situated peer news outlets, based on analytics provided by the social media platform.
