Critical of media, paper needing to lose content (8)
I believe the answer is:
pressing
'critical' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'media paper needing to lose content' is the wordplay.
'media' becomes 'press' (the press is part of the media).
'paper' becomes 'i' (UK newspaper).
'needing' is a charade indicator (letters next to each other).
'to lose content' becomes 'ng' (I can't explain this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'press'+'i'+'ng'='PRESSING'
'of' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for pressing that I've seen before include "Requiring quick action" , "Urgent or crowding" , "in need of immediate attention" , "Requiring immediate attention" , "application of buttons?" .)