4 ms·
newspapers are un-needed intermediaries. For whatever weird reasons AP and Reuters and the like don't want the hassle of 6 billion individual subscribers, so t
by VLM 11y ago
newspapers are un-needed intermediaries. For whatever weird reasons AP and Reuters and the like don't want the hassle of 6 billion individual subscribers, so they contract out to an intermediary who pays them a vaguely fixed amount per month based on viewer numbers and then the intermediary stuffs the pages with ads and clickbait headlines to profit more than their 1000 competitors trying to do the same thing, which is unsustainable.
But they aren't "really" needed, as mere intermediaries.
Someone should startup a "newspaper" that doesn't bother with filler or ads or clickbait and just aggregates and handles subscription costs that funnel back to Reuters (or AP, or ...). I'd pay a little more for "The Intercept" and "Linux weekly news" in addition to the standard Reuters feed. Basically a pay version of the google reader / newsblur / rss ecological system.
I'm not seeing the newspapers as valuable intermediaries. They, and their clickbait headlines and ads, can just go away and nothing of value will be lost. We'll still have the sources of raw news.
- javaun 11y agoAP is a member-owned organization (owned by national/regional papers), that's why they can't really go direct to consumers. NPR is the same way. NPR's board is owned by member stations, which is why you only hear Morning Addition and All Things Considered either on terrestrial radio or co-branded with the stations on NPR One. You won't see NPR distributing a full podcast of either shows. The governance model is tied to the old method of local distribution and at odds with the way the Web works.
- theg2 11y agoBecause without those "un-needed intermediaries" paying the bill for AP content, the AP couldn't afford to run. And I'm guessing this then makes it OK for there to be only 1 source of news by your claims then as well. No chance for bias there eh?