5 ms·

The next attack on journalism might be great curation, not robots. Why ? because no single human has the capability to write the best story in any given case.Ad

by paletoy 12y ago

The next attack on journalism might be great curation, not robots. Why ? because no single human has the capability to write the best story in any given case.Add to that the capabilities of unpaid bloggers, industry insiders and the like, you get a serious threat to journalism. Alas ,there are no great content curation tools AFAIK.But when there will be...

lemma 12y ago
Can you expand on this? What would great curation/curation tools look like? I feel like I agree with this insight, but don't know much about the field.
- marban 12y ago
  Keep an eye on http://www.superious.com http://www.superious.com
  - n0rm 12y ago
    I expected it to ask for my email address and tell me when they go live. Do you know of any trick to automatize the lookout?
    - uptown 12y ago
      https://www.changedetection.com/ https://www.changedetection.com/ should do what you're looking for.
- paletoy 12y ago
  Giving you articles that are fun,strongly insightful and 100% right almost every time, on your exact interests is the goal of a great curation.Bonus points for short an to the point writeup when appropriate. How do you do it ? not sure yet. The best that i can do today to do is constantly weeding out my blogs/twitter subscriptions. But i'm far from that goal.
  - austenallred 12y ago
    That's similar to what we're trying to do with http://grasswire.com http://grasswire.com, but not so much "articles" as "tweets/videos," and crowdsource fact-checking after the fact. So, maybe not very much like it at all, but I agree with your original analysis that curation will be king. News/journalism feels very much like the Internet did pre-Google. There has to be some aspect of real-time curation/fact-checking built in IMO. But obviously I'm extremely biased.
  - TelmoMenezes 12y ago
    > ... on your exact interests is the goal of a great curation I am not so sure this is a good idea. It will trap people in bubbles, where they will find only an echo chamber for their existing opinions and never have them challenged. It will insulates them from serendipity and it will prevent them from exploring, acquiring new interests and perspectives and so on.
    - chris_va 12y ago
      People keep worrying about filter bubbles, which is a rational but misguided fear. Having written some of these systems (Google News), it really does not happen the way people imagine it would. At the end of the day, the factors that define a good curation framework do not actually create a filter bubble. People love serendipitously discovering new content, and the optimizing for the "best article" does not actually optimize for a singular viewpoint. As a result, any curation system that produces a filter bubble will not actually feel as good of a system to the end user, and will not get as much adoption.
      - paletoy 12y ago
        Chris, any tips on how find good curated sources ?
      - declan 12y ago
        Yep. I’ve heard complaints about “filter bubbles” before, but have always found these to be entirely theoretical — not a critique of an actual implemented system. In reality, as <chris_va> says, a “filter bubble” is different from a “viewpoint bubble.” An example: If our recommendation engine at http://recent.io/ http://recent.io/ concludes you’re interested in Barack Obama, it will (surprise!) recommend articles about Barack Obama. It doesn’t filter by political viewpoint. You’ll get articles from both lefty sources and right-leaning sources. Also, of course, we offer “top news” if you prefer!
EGreg 12y ago
I think Pete Cashmore founder of Mashable spoke about the rise of curation a few years ago.

by paletoy 12y ago

lemma 12y ago

Can you expand on this? What would great curation/curation tools look like? I feel like I agree with this insight, but don't know much about the field.

marban 12y ago
Keep an eye on http://www.superious.com http://www.superious.com
- n0rm 12y ago
  I expected it to ask for my email address and tell me when they go live. Do you know of any trick to automatize the lookout?
  - uptown 12y ago
    https://www.changedetection.com/ https://www.changedetection.com/ should do what you're looking for.
paletoy 12y ago
Giving you articles that are fun,strongly insightful and 100% right almost every time, on your exact interests is the goal of a great curation.Bonus points for short an to the point writeup when appropriate. How do you do it ? not sure yet. The best that i can do today to do is constantly weeding out my blogs/twitter subscriptions. But i'm far from that goal.
- austenallred 12y ago
  That's similar to what we're trying to do with http://grasswire.com http://grasswire.com, but not so much "articles" as "tweets/videos," and crowdsource fact-checking after the fact. So, maybe not very much like it at all, but I agree with your original analysis that curation will be king. News/journalism feels very much like the Internet did pre-Google. There has to be some aspect of real-time curation/fact-checking built in IMO. But obviously I'm extremely biased.
- TelmoMenezes 12y ago
  > ... on your exact interests is the goal of a great curation I am not so sure this is a good idea. It will trap people in bubbles, where they will find only an echo chamber for their existing opinions and never have them challenged. It will insulates them from serendipity and it will prevent them from exploring, acquiring new interests and perspectives and so on.
  - chris_va 12y ago
    People keep worrying about filter bubbles, which is a rational but misguided fear. Having written some of these systems (Google News), it really does not happen the way people imagine it would. At the end of the day, the factors that define a good curation framework do not actually create a filter bubble. People love serendipitously discovering new content, and the optimizing for the "best article" does not actually optimize for a singular viewpoint. As a result, any curation system that produces a filter bubble will not actually feel as good of a system to the end user, and will not get as much adoption.
    - paletoy 12y ago
      Chris, any tips on how find good curated sources ?
    - declan 12y ago
      Yep. I’ve heard complaints about “filter bubbles” before, but have always found these to be entirely theoretical — not a critique of an actual implemented system. In reality, as <chris_va> says, a “filter bubble” is different from a “viewpoint bubble.” An example: If our recommendation engine at http://recent.io/ http://recent.io/ concludes you’re interested in Barack Obama, it will (surprise!) recommend articles about Barack Obama. It doesn’t filter by political viewpoint. You’ll get articles from both lefty sources and right-leaning sources. Also, of course, we offer “top news” if you prefer!

EGreg 12y ago

I think Pete Cashmore founder of Mashable spoke about the rise of curation a few years ago.