Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Google to add 'news feed' to website and app

bbc.co.uk

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 189 posts

Re: Google to add 'news feed' to website and app

#81

Post by verytrivial »

spookyuser wrote: post #63
verytrivial wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disabled them after about a day and I don't feel like I'm missing anything. I have about as much respect for news/trivia noise as the ads you hear in call hold music.

Please tell me how? Is there a way to disable them without disabling google now?

Nope! There's no way. Funny, that.

(Same goes for Google's new-ish "share location" feature of Maps. Want that? Then you'll have to share and record you location for all apps. And you have to hunt into settings to re-disable it EVERY SINGLE TIME. It's a feature! Basically a Trojan horse for Google's "record everything" business need, but less immediately threatening. A Trojan gnat, perhaps.)

Re: Google to add 'news feed' to website and app

#82

Post by damandloi »

to_bpr wrote: post #5

>The feed will include news stories from a variety of publishers, to avoid the so-called filter bubble effect, where people follow only content aligned with their pre-existing point of view. >"To provide information from diverse perspectives, news stories may have multiple viewpoints from a variety of sources... and, when available, you'll be able to fact check," the company said in a blog post. I'm growing increasin…

Agree to it or not, all B2C companies want to maximize the time you spend with them and therefore, will push everyone for consumption rather than creation.

Re: Google to add 'news feed' to website and app

#83

Post by abritinthebay »

crowbahr wrote: post #72
abritinthebay wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because they don’t track you so can’t make assumptions about what you want/mean. Trade offs.

I like what Google gives me in return for consuming my data, personally.

Sure. That’s totally a valid position.

I think there’s a middle ground though - and Google is far far on one side of it.

Re: Google to add 'news feed' to website and app

#84

Post by BigJono »

aphextron wrote: post #46
BigJono wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 10 years ago there was a such thing as standards in journalism Was there? Because last I checked all that these so called 'reputable' sources of news seem to put out is biased garbage full of misleading data and often blatant lies. I've seen better journalism from bloody buzzfeed than I have from some of the "proper" news networks in Australia...

>Was there? Because last I checked all that these so called 'reputable' sources of news seem to put out is biased garbage full of misleading data and often blatant lies. The inculcation of this sentiment is precisely the effect I'm referring to. The waters have become so muddied with nonsense that no one can tell right from wrong anymore. And thus, actual news organizations with trained reporters and fact checkers an…

I'm not sure I follow. It sounds like you're blaming blogs and online media for the decline in credibility of newspapers.

Newspapers aren't credible anymore because they continuously make the conscious decision to run bullshit stories full of twisted truths in the pursuit of sales, as they have always done. The only reason they had any credibility before is because people blindly accepted what they said without the tools to verify it.

They've had the same amount of journalistic integrity as they've always had. I.E plenty until there's a buck to be made by forgoing it.

Re: Google to add 'news feed' to website and app

#85

Post by orbitingpluto »

What I want to know about Google's news feed priorities is what possessed them to think it's a good idea to completely overtake the Play Newsstand app?

To access a magazine subscription, you must open Play Newsstand, click on the Library icon now relocated to the bottom (as they've culled all options from the hamburger menu), then scroll down every single news feed source to which you are subscribed (I believe there are defaults as well), just to get to your most recent issues.

I spend about 10x more for magazines on Play Newsstand than I do on Play movie rentals & android apps every year. Yet the options for automating downloads, selecting the type/quality of download, verifying library content, etc are amateurish at best. You cannot even read a magazine using Google Chrome in Linux.

I also have almost a full year's worth of a subscription that doesn't even show up. When I called support, they stated it was a known issue. No refund and no attempt to fix. $70 down the drain.

But yeah, my news feed is so much more important than the household $500/yr on magazine subscriptions.

Re: Google to add 'news feed' to website and app

#86

Post by cyxxon »

pjc50 wrote: post #68
thomyorkie wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The difference is personalization. I never would visit a portal site like yahoo, but every morning I look through my Google Now feed. Relevance matters.

Does anyone else remember the personalisable "iGoogle"?

Yeah, I actually hated when that went away. I had several RSS feeds on there, my inbox, my calendar... never found a good replacement. I used Netvives for a while, but it was somehow not the same (can't really put my finger on it, though).

Re: Google to add 'news feed' to website and app

#87

Post by return0 »

aphextron wrote: post #11

The "newsfeed" pattern is one of the worst ideas humanity has ever had. Never has it been so easy to manipulate public opinion at will. 10 years ago there was a such thing as standards in journalism. Now anypoliticalblog.com's headline has been promoted to the equal status of an actual news organisation by means of the implicit legitimacy of appearing in a news feed. This insanity has reached a crescendo with the off…

Human nature was always as easy to manipulate. It was just never so transparent.

Re: Google to add 'news feed' to website and app

#89

Post by SmellyGeekBoy »

pjc50 wrote: post #68
thomyorkie wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The difference is personalization. I never would visit a portal site like yahoo, but every morning I look through my Google Now feed. Relevance matters.

Does anyone else remember the personalisable "iGoogle"?

It was my homepage for the longest time. Such a great service. Sadly now I have to come to HN and hope there's something of interest here when I have 15 minutes to spare.

Re: Google to add 'news feed' to website and app

#90

Post by dredmorbius »

thomyorkie wrote: post #26
pesenti wrote: post #9

20 years ago, all the engines (AltaVista, Lycos) did exactly that. And then they all became "portal" like. And then a brand new engine with just a search box (so refreshing so clean) came along and swiped them over....

The difference is personalization. I never would visit a portal site like yahoo, but every morning I look through my Google Now feed. Relevance matters.

http://www.freshnews.org

An early RSS-based aggregator -- but you could (and can) choose your feeds, if you like.

Post reply on HN