4 ms·

I'm a young guy, and I get multiple newspapers, and a few news magazines delivered. I don't like new media like reddit and "social news aggregators", because yo

I'm a young guy, and I get multiple newspapers, and a few news magazines delivered. I don't like new media like reddit and "social news aggregators", because you're replacing professional editors w/ unpaid volunteers and "votes".

JoeAltmaier 10y ago
Instead of crowd-sourcing what gets published/visible, trust some anonymous individuals at a newspaper? Who has only one agenda instead of a mixture of many voices and ideals? That's got its downside too. The bubble is created there by what tiny number of voices are included in the subscription list.
- lisa_q 10y ago
  "some anonymous individuals at a newspaper" ...you mean professional journalists who actually report on subjects of their expertise?
  - JoeAltmaier 10y ago
    No I mean editors who determine what makes it on to the printed page.
    - goatlover 10y ago
      Editors aren't also professionals who work with the journalists? What you're advocating for is a lot of amateur voices with limited resources in comparison and a plethora of personal agendas. It's more democratic than having a few professional curators. But is that better?
      - JoeAltmaier 10y ago
        Its varied. That's the point.
    - niccaluim 10y ago
      Right. So, professional journalists with experience, and who are anything but anonymous.
      - JoeAltmaier 10y ago
        Except when they are, like with the Economist. Anyway, they're single voices, not a variety. So bubble.
  - VLM 10y ago
    "professional journalists who actually report on subjects of their expertise" The world is full of domain experts who all know the journalists get everything wrong about their specialty, but out of misguided charity think its just an odd mistake and journalists in general know everything about every OTHER specialty and can't wait to read those stories. I'd love to read tech journalism from someone who has run a compiler on source code they themselves wrote. Its out there, but not at mainstream prestigious sites where all that matters is class rank at Columbia. The problem with newspapers is we have more than about 3. Back when they printed and delivered paper scaling meant we have 1000 substandard local papers all of which equally suck. Someday we'll have like 3 and they'll actually be worth reading. But a lot of jobs have to go away first. That's going to have interesting effect on journalism schools. Can you even run one, if there's only three small employers? May go back to the days when most journalists have a degree in something else.
  - ci5er 10y ago
    Maybe a journalist is an expert on whatever it is that they are covering, and maybe they are not. Regardless, they are over-worked, spread-thin and the most erudite probably not universally syndicated. I've certainly experienced the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect myself (for years!), but each bump up against the practice of modern journalism makes me a little bit more disillusioned (and sad, because it is surely an important function.)
  - pjc50 10y ago
    The UK press are spectacularly partisan. Brexit is their greatest achievement. The US press are more subtly handicapped by believing that the midpoint between partisans is "balanced". The Trump campaign is showing how ridiculous this can become.
  - flukus 10y ago
    > .you mean professional journalists who actually report on subjects of their expertise? Go read the IT section of your local paper and see if you still think that.
- AlexandrB 10y ago
  > Who has only one agenda instead of a mixture of many voices and ideals? I think you've nailed the value proposition of newspapers and other hand-curated services here. When dealing with a single editorial voice their biases and a agenda are at least knowable and mostly consistent. Compare to "crowdsourcing" where the agenda and bias you get may change day to day based on bots, advertisers, scammers, and online mobs gaming the system. Likewise "deep learning" makes decisions based on an algorithm unlike that of any human and is not easily easily pinned down to a consistent agenda either.
- Zikes 10y ago
  Reddit is crowd-sourced for things like cat gifs and porn. For news, it's heavily curated by people with agendas and biases. It's as "fair and balanced" as Fox News.
- orbitur 10y ago
  I think a look at reddit shows that you can trust crowdsourced news much less than say, the NYT or WaPo. Twitter's a bit different, there are good reporters on the ground who tweet a lot, but Twitter is terrible at actual aggregation. Honestly, a dedicated newsroom is better.

JoeAltmaier 10y ago

Instead of crowd-sourcing what gets published/visible, trust some anonymous individuals at a newspaper? Who has only one agenda instead of a mixture of many voices and ideals? That's got its downside too. The bubble is created there by what tiny number of voices are included in the subscription list.

lisa_q 10y ago
"some anonymous individuals at a newspaper" ...you mean professional journalists who actually report on subjects of their expertise?
- JoeAltmaier 10y ago
  No I mean editors who determine what makes it on to the printed page.
  - goatlover 10y ago
    Editors aren't also professionals who work with the journalists? What you're advocating for is a lot of amateur voices with limited resources in comparison and a plethora of personal agendas. It's more democratic than having a few professional curators. But is that better?
    - JoeAltmaier 10y ago
      Its varied. That's the point.
  - niccaluim 10y ago
    Right. So, professional journalists with experience, and who are anything but anonymous.
    - JoeAltmaier 10y ago
      Except when they are, like with the Economist. Anyway, they're single voices, not a variety. So bubble.
- VLM 10y ago
  "professional journalists who actually report on subjects of their expertise" The world is full of domain experts who all know the journalists get everything wrong about their specialty, but out of misguided charity think its just an odd mistake and journalists in general know everything about every OTHER specialty and can't wait to read those stories. I'd love to read tech journalism from someone who has run a compiler on source code they themselves wrote. Its out there, but not at mainstream prestigious sites where all that matters is class rank at Columbia. The problem with newspapers is we have more than about 3. Back when they printed and delivered paper scaling meant we have 1000 substandard local papers all of which equally suck. Someday we'll have like 3 and they'll actually be worth reading. But a lot of jobs have to go away first. That's going to have interesting effect on journalism schools. Can you even run one, if there's only three small employers? May go back to the days when most journalists have a degree in something else.
- ci5er 10y ago
  Maybe a journalist is an expert on whatever it is that they are covering, and maybe they are not. Regardless, they are over-worked, spread-thin and the most erudite probably not universally syndicated. I've certainly experienced the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect myself (for years!), but each bump up against the practice of modern journalism makes me a little bit more disillusioned (and sad, because it is surely an important function.)
- pjc50 10y ago
  The UK press are spectacularly partisan. Brexit is their greatest achievement. The US press are more subtly handicapped by believing that the midpoint between partisans is "balanced". The Trump campaign is showing how ridiculous this can become.
- flukus 10y ago
  > .you mean professional journalists who actually report on subjects of their expertise? Go read the IT section of your local paper and see if you still think that.
AlexandrB 10y ago
> Who has only one agenda instead of a mixture of many voices and ideals? I think you've nailed the value proposition of newspapers and other hand-curated services here. When dealing with a single editorial voice their biases and a agenda are at least knowable and mostly consistent. Compare to "crowdsourcing" where the agenda and bias you get may change day to day based on bots, advertisers, scammers, and online mobs gaming the system. Likewise "deep learning" makes decisions based on an algorithm unlike that of any human and is not easily easily pinned down to a consistent agenda either.
Zikes 10y ago
Reddit is crowd-sourced for things like cat gifs and porn. For news, it's heavily curated by people with agendas and biases. It's as "fair and balanced" as Fox News.
orbitur 10y ago
I think a look at reddit shows that you can trust crowdsourced news much less than say, the NYT or WaPo. Twitter's a bit different, there are good reporters on the ground who tweet a lot, but Twitter is terrible at actual aggregation. Honestly, a dedicated newsroom is better.