Last year, award-winning journalists Julia Angwin and Jeff Larson left ProPublica to start a data-driven media startup called The Markup. This week, the future of not-yet-launched The Markup appeared to be in jeopardy, as Angwin was fired by Larson and their other co-founder Sue Gardner, and most of their reporters publicly resigned in solidarity.
On the latest episode of Recode Decode with Kara Swisher, recorded in front of a live audience at the Line Hotel in Washington, DC, Angwin said the firing stemmed from a fundamental disagreement: Whether The Markup should be based on reporting, or on an explicit anti-tech advocacy agenda. After people in attendance at the taping shared some of Angwin’s comments online, Larson and Gardner called Recode to dispute her claims; you can read their objections here.
“Once we started getting into it, it just became clear that she was taking a much more anti-tech position than I,” Angwin said of Gardner. “And I’m obviously known for…
