Carlos Barria/Reuters
After its decision to slap National Public Radio with a “state-affiliated media” label drew sharp criticism this week, Twitter is whistling a (slightly) different tune, tweaking the label to read “government funded” in a quiet change made late Saturday.
The tag was also affixed to the accounts of several other news outlets that receive some state support, including PBS, the BBC, and Voice of America. It appears to have been inconsistently applied—as of Sunday evening, the accounts of other government-backed outlets like Canada’s CBC and Qatar’s Al Jazeera did not bear the label. Other accounts affiliated with the BBC, such as those belonging to its breaking news and international news desks, were also untagged.
The designation drew a quick response from the BBC, which said in a statement that it was “speaking to Twitter to resolve this issue as soon as possible.”