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Things you notice when you quit the news (2016)

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Re: Things you notice when you quit the news (2016)

#531

Post by ethbr0 »

themacguffinman wrote: post #448
ethbr0 wrote: post #406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair! Imho, there's two classes of actual threats. (1) A sudden, well-prepared realignment of the status quo, enforced afterwards on an ongoing basis. (2) The slow realignment of expectations (aka boiling the frog slowly). It seems like people often see (2), when in reality few groups are farsighted and patient enough to successfully carry that off. In reality what they're seeing is the normal sausage-making of a dem…

I don't know why you think (2) relies on groups being farsighted and patient. The frog boiling that happens today is almost always a result of chaotic incentivization. Politics is very different today than maybe 20 years ago. No conspiracy needed for that. Yet these unintentional or perhaps even well-intentioned changes to the status quo can be worth observing and reasoning about. A single district mandating critical…

As to the slow shifts, I said they were the opposite of rare, and indeed constantly happening as consensus shifts and is rebrokered.

Which was a response to the comment I was replying to, regarding distinguishing actual danger from everything else.

Danger, to me, means subversion of democracy and/or individual freedoms. Which means either a minority wilfully shifting the zeitgeist out of proportion with their strength of support or taking away people's freedom to participate in democracy.

It does not include everyone deciding to gradually change their ideals.

If the country as a whole is becoming more racist (to create an example), in terms of population percentage, then that's a structural social issue that needs to be addressed as such. Awareness of current news isn't going to enable one to address or change that.

Re: Things you notice when you quit the news (2016)

#532

Post by brewdad »

usefulcat wrote: post #420
Swenrekcah wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can fully attest to the quality of the Economist but I caution anyone to subscribe because they don’t provide any way to easily unsubscribe. It’s either to call some phone number or attempt it via live chat. I tried the second option and the representative just went on with the script trying to fatigue me out of it, no matter what I said.

If I were going to subscribe to a print magazine, I'd pay via check, assuming they will allow that.

Be careful with that. There may very well be fine print that allows them to continue taking funds after the initial period, same as with a credit card. A personal check (in the US) contains all the info a company needs to debit your bank account.

Re: Things you notice when you quit the news (2016)

#533

Post by drenvuk »

ff317 wrote: post #296
yojo wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a firm believer in quality over quantity when it comes to news. Google News has gotten increasingly annoying though, forcing me harder toward the "personalized" results, the kind of filter bubble I'm intentionally trying to avoid. What worked well for me was getting a print subscription to the Economist. They definitely have a bias (particularly in their editorials), but it's mostly of the "free trade" variety, w…

My personal favorite recommendation in this vein is The Atlantic: https://www.theatlantic.com/ . They've got some great writers and editors and often deliver pretty unique insights. Their articles tend towards long-ish-form, but not nearly as long as e.g. the New Yorker. They're a little less world-focused and more US-centric, but not completely. There is some bias (isn't there always?), but I've seen them cover a si…

The Atlantic. The New Yorker. The Economist. These are neutral to left facing. In a feeble effort to avoid being put in a different bubble, does anyone have something that an educated republican/conservative would read?

Re: Things you notice when you quit the news (2016)

#534

Post by sosborn »

drenvuk wrote: post #533
ff317 wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My personal favorite recommendation in this vein is The Atlantic: https://www.theatlantic.com/ . They've got some great writers and editors and often deliver pretty unique insights. Their articles tend towards long-ish-form, but not nearly as long as e.g. the New Yorker. They're a little less world-focused and more US-centric, but not completely. There is some bias (isn't there always?), but I've seen them cover a si…

The Atlantic. The New Yorker. The Economist. These are neutral to left facing. In a feeble effort to avoid being put in a different bubble, does anyone have something that an educated republican/conservative would read?

https://www.reuters.com/

Re: Things you notice when you quit the news (2016)

#535

Post by [deleted] »

drenvuk wrote: post #533
ff317 wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My personal favorite recommendation in this vein is The Atlantic: https://www.theatlantic.com/ . They've got some great writers and editors and often deliver pretty unique insights. Their articles tend towards long-ish-form, but not nearly as long as e.g. the New Yorker. They're a little less world-focused and more US-centric, but not completely. There is some bias (isn't there always?), but I've seen them cover a si…

The Atlantic. The New Yorker. The Economist. These are neutral to left facing. In a feeble effort to avoid being put in a different bubble, does anyone have something that an educated republican/conservative would read?

[deleted]

Re: Things you notice when you quit the news (2016)

#536

Post by smcnally »

TedDoesntTalk wrote: post #520
thrashh wrote: post #485

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah the Economist is pretty well known to be neoliberal. Which is fine… I subscribe and it’s a pretty good source if you understand that.

Why are the journalists and writers names not revealed?

That’s a specific editorial decision[0] to present work in The Economist’s voice rather than the individual journalists’.

[0] https://www.economist.com/the-economist-explains/2013/09/04/...

Re: Things you notice when you quit the news (2016)

#537

Post by strangeattractr »

james-redwood wrote: post #144
flats wrote: post #83

I strongly agree with this. I would, however, like to call out one TV program here in the U.S. that I think comes much closer to approximating the experience of “reading a 5,000-word article”: PBS NewsHour. It’s great, completely free and available to watch online, and you can even get most of what you need from their podcast alone ( https://www.pbs.org/newshour/feeds/rss/podcasts/segments ). It consists of fairly in…

I would have also recommended the Economist until I experienced a Gell-Mann amnesiac effect [1] with regards to an article they wrote about South Africa, a country where I lived much of my life in, in which they so horrifically butchered the coverage I simply canceled my subscription for fear of how inaccurate everything else might have been. [1]: https://www.epsilontheory.com/gell-mann-amnesia/

As a counterpoint, I've found The Economist is quite good on my own domestic politics when it does cover it - albeit rarely.

To me this quote underlines the importance of reading news from varied sources rather than not reading it at all. I mean clearly 99.99% of news I ignore, but if I think it's important I'll read about it from multiple papers because the one I primarily read - the FT will have its own viewpoint.

Re: Things you notice when you quit the news (2016)

#539

Post by smcnally »

smcnally wrote: post #536
TedDoesntTalk wrote: post #520

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are the journalists and writers names not revealed?

That’s a specific editorial decision[0] to present work in The Economist’s voice rather than the individual journalists’. [0] https://www.economist.com/the-economist-explains/2013/09/04/...

~no regwall

https://medium.economist.com/why-are-the-economists-writers-...

and previous discussion

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14015708

Re: Things you notice when you quit the news (2016)

#540

Post by hguant »

drenvuk wrote: post #533
ff317 wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My personal favorite recommendation in this vein is The Atlantic: https://www.theatlantic.com/ . They've got some great writers and editors and often deliver pretty unique insights. Their articles tend towards long-ish-form, but not nearly as long as e.g. the New Yorker. They're a little less world-focused and more US-centric, but not completely. There is some bias (isn't there always?), but I've seen them cover a si…

The Atlantic. The New Yorker. The Economist. These are neutral to left facing. In a feeble effort to avoid being put in a different bubble, does anyone have something that an educated republican/conservative would read?

Wall Street Journal - there's a quip from someone that when he wanted to read things he agreed with, he opened Jacobin, when he wanted to know what was going on in the world, he went to WSJ. Being based entirely on serving money anchors you to a certain reality that can't be swung to far left or right. The journalism has had some really great scoops these last few years - they broke a lot of the Facebook drama, and some tax evasion shenanigans - while the editorials tend to be pretty principled conservatism ("we'll give a voice to anyone, but we'll put a letter from the Editors in where we call them liars" seems to be their approach to Trump and co).

National Review is similar to The Atlantic in that their long form pieces meant for print publication are wonderful, and tend to be rather nuanced, whiletheir short pieces meant for immediate internet consumption are heavily biased. They're interesting in that they take a "big tent" approach, and will allow a lont of dissenting voices to appear under their mast head - this was always true but became really rather evident during the 2016 elections.

The Dispatch is made up of authors and editors who didn't like that Trump supporters were allowed under the "Big Tent" of the National Review. It's edited by Jonah Goldberg, and David French, who shows up as a guest writer for the Atlantic every now and then.

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