Last Week’s News Comedically: Shannon-Weaver Model, Noise, and Mediums

News Covering: March 21, 2025 – March 27, 2025

This week we saw a major focus on the breach of U.S. national security when the Editor-in-Chief of the Atlantic, Jeffery Goldberg, was added to a group chat of top American officials on Signal, which outlined military strike plans on the Houthis in Yemen.

This week, both Seth Meyers and Jon Oliver were off, so I’ve opted to add in coverage from the Daily show with this week’s host: Ronny Chieng. If you’re Canadian, or interested in the Canadian election, I highly recommend listening to this past Monday’s episode of Front Burner. This episode was called An Election in a Polluted Media Environment, and was posted Monday, March 25, 2025.

This podcast touched on some excellent topics, especially as we continue to look at where we get our news and how information is spread, and the importance of continuing to search for multiple sources to verify key details and top stories.

Last week I discussed the concepts of information overload, flooding the zone, and key messages. I also committed to introducing some communications models and introducing a new concept called noise. Now there are a lot of communications models out there, but I’m going to focus on one today to help ease our way in a little bit as we start to define and think more of how communication works.

When I think about models of communication, I find it helpful to think about them as an order of operation. Picture communication as having steps. For instance: Step 1, Step 2, Step 3, Step 4, and so on. In many models, scholars use this sort of breakdown to help us better understand how we might communicate with one another. One of the most popular models of communication is called the Shannon Weaver Model (revised). This model goes as follows:

Source
Encoder
Channel [With possibility of noise]
Decoder
Receiver
Feedback (which goes through the same process starting back at step one)

Now I know we’ve got a lot of unusual words in this model, so if you’re new to communication, or a little rough around the edges (like me), you may need a little bit of help breaking them down, so let me give you an explanation of each term, and practical example using the model.

So, in the instance of talking about this model of communication, the source refers to the source of a message, so who, or what, is sending the message. The encoder would be what is being used to create this message, say if you were writing it would be your hands, if you were speaking it would be your mouth. The channel refers to the medium the message is being delivered in, so if it was written down on paper, it would be the paper, if it was spoken word, it would be the airways or the telephone you’re using. The decoder means whatever is being used to receive the message, so your eyes for reading a message, or your ears for hearing a message. The receiver is the individual who is the recipient of the message. And finally, feedback allows for two-way communication: for the receiver to send a reply (a message) back to the original source of the first message. This particular theory suggests a linear approach to communication, whereas other, later theories, suggest communication is transactional, continuous, and ongoing. The addition of feedback allows for a little more of a transactional approach, but we can get into that later on!

Now, noise is an interesting addition to this model of communication. Noise refers to something that might impact the message while being transmitted from the source to the receiver. As an example of this, we could go back to that telephone example above. When talking on the phone, you could be in the car or out in public, where it is quite literally noisy, and you can’t decode the message properly as you couldn’t hear every word clearly. Noise can refer to both internal and external noise. External noise being environmental, such as the sound of a car, or loud music, and internal noise coming from within, for instance physiological (needing to use the restroom for example), or psychological (stress about an exam or a breakup).

Here’s an example using my blog:

Source (Me!)
Encoder (My hands – in this case typing on the keyboard)
Channel (My blog written on my website/Substack)
Decoder (Your eyes)
Receiver (You!)
Feedback (You leaving comments or having a conversation with me on what I’ve written)

Something else I’d like to touch on too, is a common phrase you might be familiar with. Coined by Marshal McLuhan: “the medium is the message.” Now up above you may have noticed that I used the term mediumalready. Medium refers to the mode of communicating a message, for instance over television, the phone, a letter, or a road sign. There are many mediums for communication available to us. Marshal McLuhan argued that there was a significant importance in the medium that was used to communicate a message to an audience/receiver. The reason I’m bringing this up, is to simply encourage some thought on how you interact with messages you see and receive on a daily basis. For example, even this blog. If we follow the Shannon Weaver model, your feedback to me would likely be in the form of a written comment, whereas if I delivered this text instead as a monologue to a friend, they could provide me with feedback instantaneously… and as other models suggest, throughout my verbal delivery.

So, I leave it there this week, and now, let’s get to the news.

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Monday, March 24, 2025

Jon Stewart on Which Speech Is Free and Which Will Cost You in Trump’s America | The Daily Show

Stewart covered:

The National Security breach of government officials using a group on the social media platform Signal to discuss war plans against Houthi rebels in Yemen, while having included a reporter from the Atlantic in the group.“Cause as you know there are certain hypocrisies and absurdities that we find in our cultural moment that make for great fodder for humorous dialogue, a facial expression, a nod and a wink. Then there are other pronouncements by our elected officials, actions by our government that are so baldly bullshit.”
Republican’s defense of free speech, and the accusation that the left are “thought police.” Claiming that the Trump administration will restore free speech.
Trump’s comments on news sources that have posted negative coverage, and his thought that they should be illegal and lose their licenses.
Post secondary schools bowing to Trump’s threats to pull funding for schools that support certain protests.
Trump stating that judges he appointed received hate and how that should be illegal, and then days later, suggested that a judge Obama had appointed should be impeached because he rules against Trump.
The removal of words related to DEI (and honestly some not related to DEI at all) from government websites.
Trump’s desire for a portrait of himself be removed from the Colorado State capitol as he found the painting unflattering.
Trump’s fondness of social media platforms such as Meta and X.
How social media platforms serve users a feed that leads them down conservative rabbit holes.

Trump’s Kennedy Center Takeover | Kristi Noem Taunts Canada | Taking Greenland

Colbert covered:

His visit to the Kennedy Center and the celebration of Conan O’Brien’s career.
Trump’s intent to make the Kennedy Center’s programming “slightly more conservative.” Featuring more conservative musicals.
A joke suggesting that Colbert (who hosted Kennedy Centre Honors), would trade roles with President Trump, Trump could host, and Colbert could be president.
Trump suggesting Zero to be the next host.
Trump’s displeasure for a portrait of him that was place in Colorado’s State capitol. Colbert also talked about the Go Fund Me organized by State Republicans that was used to help raise money for the creation of the portrait.
Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem’s visit to Haskell Free Library and Opera House, a library which is on the border of Quebec and Vermont and is frequently shared by both Canadians and Americans without crossing an official border cross, and declared that Canadians would now need to enter through official crossings as the library is being sued by drug smugglers.
Trump’s desire to gain Greenland, and sending Second Lady Usha Vance to Greenland.

Tuesday, March 25, 2025

Republicans Desperately Spin Yemen Group Chat Fumble | The Daily Show

Ronny Chieng covered:

The Yemen group chat scandal.
Republican’s defending the incident by simply stating “it was just a mistake, everyone makes mistakes.”
Following that point up, Republicans then tried expressing pride in the commitment and professionalism of the individuals involved.
Next, they suggested that the reporter (Goldberg) was lying.

Signalgate: Trump Tries To Dodge Explosive National Security Scandal | All Of Them Should Be Fired

Colbert covered:

The national security scandal where government officials added a journalist to a Signal group chat where they were discussing classified details about an attack on Yemen.
Pete Hegseth denying the allegations, and Trump stated that he had no idea what reporters were talking about.

Wednesday, March 26, 2025

Republicans Play “War Plan” Semantics As More Damning Texts Released | The Daily Show

Ronny Chieng covered:

A brief mention of 23 and Me going bankrupt.
Republicans refusing to take responsibility for the Signal group scandal.
Pete Hegseth insisting that “no one was texting war plans.”
The Atlantic sharing screenshots of the war plans.
Republicans stating that the plans were “not war plan.”

Hegseth’s Sloppy Security Breach | Mike Waltz: Goldberg’s Number Got “Sucked In” To My Phone

Colbert covered:

The security breach as discussed yesterday.
The argument Trump and his administration is that the breach was unimportant, claimed that the journalist who had been added into the group chat “found it very boring and he left early.”
The Atlantic (the newspaper the journalist is with) posted screenshots from the conversations. Before releasing the screenshots they had contacted the Whitehouse which stated “there was no classified information… however… This was intended to be a an internal and private deliberation… So for those reason – yes, we object to the release” (spelling not corrected).
Mike Waltz (National Security Advisor), is being questioned on how he had Jeffery Goldberg’s phone number in his phone.

Thursday, March 27, 2025

Elon Musk & Billionaires Flood the Zone in Wisconsin Supreme Court Race | The Daily Show

Ronny Chieng covered:

The supreme court election in Wisconsin.
The attack ads being used in the campaign.
Elon Musk providing $100 to people who sign a petition in Wisconsin against “activist judges.” Musk also offered two one-million-dollar giveaways for people to be spokespeople for the petition.

Blame Mike Waltz | Trump Team’s Sloppy Digital Footprints | The Fertilization President

Colbert covered:

The signal security breach again.
Trump completely laying the blame on Mike Waltz.
Both Democrats and Republicans going after the administration for this breach.
The ease of finding passwords for top security officials in the U.S.
Trump’s intended support for IVF.
Republicans grilling NPR and PBS for certain shows they’ve developed. As Project 2025 seeks to end funding for public broadcasting.

And there you have it…

Another busy any chaotic week covered comedically.

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