I visited the US again last year and got the USA Today in my hotel. I thought I was being pranked. The writing, tone, complexity had all plummeted to the level of a child. That paper is basically for people who can’t figure out how to get their news from Yahoo. The Same people who get value from TV Guide.
Let me guess what Palantir will tell them: your audience is dying and/or illiterate. Add cartoons. You’re welcome.
I would argue, that helped journalism because journalists probably assumed that their readers would hold them to the same standards they hold the writers of the other papers too.
USA Today as a "my country Today" edition - but they don't have local reporters who understand my community and uncover the important stories. 3/4s of the "local" paper is fluff pieces that go into every local paper". If something nationally important to me happens I'll find out about it, but nobody is telling me what my town council is doing (the published minutes are "debated a proposal for X and voted on it, it passed" - I have an opinion on this and want to inform my next vote based on this issue, but I don't know who did what (importantly there might be a consideration I'm not aware of that would make me change my mind - which is why I don't want to lookup their vote even if I could)
edit: prepare for a lot of interesting op-eds from the nation's first newspaper printed in full color and targeted exclusively at morons. The most well-printed comics section in the industry.
Also, I remember staying at a hotel once where they delivered one to every guest room.
Surprised we haven't yet seen paid advertisement interwoven into news article text in a way that feeds AI scrapers yet, wouldn't it be nice to drink a Coke right now?
There's no law that says you have to disclose advertisement to chatbots, so you can mark it up in a way that only humans see the disclosure and poison the bot to tell everyone that Coca-Cola is America's favorite soft drink.
Besides that they're basically the most expensive, white-glove, enterprise-y version of what they do
So they view their readers as something to be monetized. Not to be educated, not to be intellectually stimulated, not to have their questions answered, not to have their curiosity satisfied, not to provide them with anything a newspaper traditionally did. Nope, they are just a source of money. Get them to click, serve them an ad, sell their tracking data.
Objection (objection.ai), which proposes to apply AI to “adjudicate the truth of journalism.” Pay $2,000 to contest allegations in a published story or various social media sources.
But I must ask: in the anti eth0 club, or is this a genuine question?
If that is not a fair question, maybe show me evidence supporting a falsifiable general rule showing that all, or the majority of comments in HN threads contain strictly directly related comments -- or at least something showing most HN threads show non-directly related comments being challenged consistently, perhaps by yourself. This would help.
On a deeper level...
As a rogue journalist, I research many things. In this case, I have been researching both Palantir and Thiel, particularly products and things funded by Theil, particularly certain YouTube influencer channels.
My research shows certain contradictions of proclaimed values that very much interest me, such as Thiel Capital funding and support of American Alchemy, which heavily promotes "neuro divergence" and an entire category of ideas that his partner, Alex Karp severely criticizes. Karp has made openly contemptuous claims on "neuro divergence" and drugs, while Thiel Capital aggressively funds American Alchemy, which is not modestly adamant on the subject, but hyper adamant, and promotes what some might call "conspiracy" related material.
However, when you have such individuals deeply connected with the Pentagon, and Law Enforcement, with verifiable influence, profiling abilities, and much more, this is something I take very seriously. As a 'journalist', I tend to see connections. I am sure you resent this, but despite an often rough approach, they have yet to fail in final synthesis. So that is what I am actually thinking, when I leave such posts.
You can’t “convert the sheer scale of our audience into known, orchestrated first-party relationships” without compromising your privacy.
Hacker News occasionally indexed Palestinian voices but this was a breath of fresh air compared to outlets like USA Today. I'm actually constantly conflicted about the sources I consume and still seek alternatives. If they want me to view more of their content, including more authoritarian surveillance technology is not the right move.
That is not helpful, and a very good way of falling down rabbit holes just because you find a source that agrees with you on one subject. That’s how you get manipulated and radicalised.
It’s much better to have a variety of sources, even if you occasionally disagree. It keeps you grounded and reminds you that other people have other opinions.
I cannot stress this enough: do not get polarised because of a single issue. That is how rational discourse dies.
For important world news there are a lot of options. However the most important news is my local community. Who covers my local school district - nobody. (This isn't true, they do send a sports reporter to the school games - but not to the school board meetings even though they matter more)
And before someone mentions the paradox of tolerance: The paradox clears itself up if you look at what tolerance actually is. It's simply not interfering with people's agency over themselves. Given that your right to self-agency doesn't entitle you to restrict others' self-agency, behavior that does try restricting others' agency is automatically not included in "tolerance."
It's one thing if both sides believe they are attempting to restrict each others' self-agency. It's also possible that both of you are wrong. Whose place is it to say what is right OR wrong? Is there even always a right or wrong? I don't think so.
https://webdoodle.substack.com
I've been protesting there for 7 years now, and this was the first year the Democratic Socialists of America showed up. It was a major improvement. Next year the rest of you need to show up.