It's worth asking how we can make our systems safer against large corporations shady influence.
Just to be clear, this story is about Apple exerting editorial control over content that they paid for, not about them trying to influence the content on the Daily Show.
Anyone who's worked in media has stories of topics being suppressed by the owners, and that's definitely something that could stand to be more transparent, but this article isn't evidence of large corporations having any influence over unrelated media outlets.
Guilt by association is now not only restricted to superficial advertising and will influence anything that can be controversial. For Apple it is even more relevant because it conflicts with their clean image.
unless you're watching state-run / state-sponsored media, which comes with it's own challenges, they're all large corporations.
we'll never know, and those corps have the right to do whatever they want.