Unless things have changed in the last few years, I'm a bit skeptical of your claim of avid readership if you're referring to The Economist as a magazine and not a newspaper.
Ask HN: Alternatives to The Economist?
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Re: Ask HN: Alternatives to The Economist?
#122Years ago before electronic devices, The Economist was my "flight fodder" in that I only really bought a copy when I had a long flight and it was long and dense enough that I'd never get through it all. I haven't read it in awhile. It's disappointing to hear the quality has gone down (if true).
You're not suggesting otherwise but I feel compelled to mention it anyway for completeness: every publication has a political bent. It's not just the editorials or even the reporting itself but also the choice on what to publish. That's not neccessarily a bad thing unless that political bent means the publication has a tenuous relationship with the truth.
I'm curious what political stance you have an issue with, as in are you more left-leaning or right-leaning.
The Economist falls into the same bucket I'd put some other long-form print media in like the Atlantic and the New Yorker: it's center-right, specifically neoliberal. That's not necessarily bad. In fact I'd read good content in all 3 of these. You just need to be aware of the lens through which they see the world. The Economist I always found to be pro-Europe (pro-EU and pro-NATO) as one example.
Some might object to the "center-right" label here. To me, that's just evidence of how far the pendulum has swung with the Overton Window in how far right-wing politics currently skews, not just in the US. CNN is a center-right media outlet, for example. Coverage of Israel-Palestine is a prime example of just how one-sided this is.
More progressive media outlets are slim pickings honestly. For general news coverage, within limits surprisingly al-Jazeera ranks pretty highly. I say "within limits" because it has the same blind spot all state media does: the state it represents. The BBC is another prime example of this.
Re: Ask HN: Alternatives to The Economist?
#123You might add https://www.spiegel.de/international/ to your list. It is free and well written.
The good thing about Financial Times: It is a UK publisher, not US-based, so the reporting on the US is more skeptical and nuanced. Less screechy. To be fair, I avoid almost all of the opinion pieces except for Martin Wolf, because he is basically writing an economics column. The rest is rather inflammatory (much lower editorial standards!) and can can readily be skipped.
Also consider the free FT AlphaVille which is a blog attached to FT. Much more casual reporting style, but they have cracked some big cases, including Dan Mccrum's year-long (later explosive) investigation into Wirecard.
Re: Ask HN: Alternatives to The Economist?
#124> It doesn't align exactly with my political values Which values? I find it to be very analytic and dry in a good way.
That's the writing style. The choice of topics, point of view, and conclusions drawn at The Economist all show political bias.
Re: Ask HN: Alternatives to The Economist?
#125I think others have given good recommendations, but will add the Atlantic and New Yorker. Also agree that a problem with The Economist is that it is always overtly pushing a particular view of the view world (rooted in a faith in the rationality of markets), which is coupled with fairly strong advice/prescriptions in much of the writing.
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Re: Ask HN: Alternatives to The Economist?
#126Quoted post unavailable.
Media Bias Fact Check describes it as a very right-biased outlet with questionable factuality. They are also categorized as "right-biased" by Ground News, "right-leaning" by AllSides and "far-right" by Wikipedia. Maybe not the best source for neutral and factual news coverage?
The YouTube ads they used to run (maybe still do, I’ve started paying to avoid ads) were painfully partisan.
Re: Ask HN: Alternatives to The Economist?
#127What are your thoughts on the journalism in The Atlantic? https://www.theatlantic.com/
I’ve let my subscription to the Atlantic lapse. The writing quality and topic selection are closer to a second-tier college newspaper than a serious journalistic publication. Most of their talented contributors are mostly gone, and the current crop of “cool kid” writers seem to just regurgitate what they are following on Twitter.
It's yet another news outlet purchased by a tech billionaire. Happened in 2017: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurene_Powell_Jobs
She's also been friends and sometimes business partners for decades with Carlos Watson, the guy who perpetrated the OZY fraud. That may help if you want an idea of her taste in, and ability to evaluate the quality of, journalism.
Re: Ask HN: Alternatives to The Economist?
#128What are your thoughts on the journalism in The Atlantic? https://www.theatlantic.com/
The journalism in The Atlantic is quite frankly garbage and they are essentially importing outrage directly from Twitter to riddle their articles with ads so they can continue to grift their subscription plan.
Re: Ask HN: Alternatives to The Economist?
#129The Spectator has - generally high quality writing - a quirky (but data driven) approach - a longer history than any other magazine - a UK focus - a right wing bent, but with plenty of left wing ( or apolitical) writers for balance. Might be a solution? I gave up on the Economist after 20years 20 years ago, for much the same reasons you state!
The Spectator is hyper-partisan nonsense that will make you less well informed. I can't imagine who the "left wing" writers on it are supposed to be?
>>I can't imagine who the "left wing" writers on it are supposed to be?
Rod Liddle - his brain is addled by the booze, but he still manages to phone in a few hundred words each fortnight.
Re: Ask HN: Alternatives to The Economist?
#130I think the only real alternative is the FT. Yes, it's not a weekly but they have lots of in-depth reporting (and the Economist refers to itself as a newspaper anyway).
If only there were a weekly version of the FT...