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The downfall of National Geographic

jjpryor.substack.com

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Re: The downfall of National Geographic

#81

Post by Fauntleroy »

brvsft wrote: post #66
Fauntleroy wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This sounds like an internalized problem that you have, and not something the magazine did themselves.

The literal title of the article mentions coolness. This appears to be a form of projection, where you think you can internet bully me into liking an article about cool tattooed people by telling me it's an "internalized" problem. But I moved on from it. I canceled my subscription. I'll never give NG money, and you're just going to have to deal with that. Sorry. Maybe you can give them your money.

You're clearly more emotional about the subject than anyone else in this thread. For what it's worth, the "internalized" problem I was referring to was suggesting that National Geographic was some kind of propadanga that pushed "democrat = cool".

Re: The downfall of National Geographic

#82

Post by HelloMcFly »

hospitalJail wrote: post #50
HelloMcFly wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a bit of a reach. To a very large many, the two most-recent Legend of Zelda games are the two best that have ever been made. Nintendo has not been afraid to change what the game even when it initially upsets people (Windwaker with the 3D cutesy feel) though the subsequent sentiment is almost always incredibly positive in retrospect. BOTW isn't like Majora's Mask anymore than Majora's Mask was like A Link to t…

>the two most-recent Legend of Zelda games are the two best that have ever been made. Idk man, I glanced at /truezelda the other day and it seems like TotK has ruined BOTW for people. I was already disenchanted about 20 hours into BOTW, climbing yet another green hill to see another green hill with the same enemies as the last hill. I did beat the game with 70 or 80 shrines. I dread shrines. I admittedly played every…

I don't think a place like /truezelda would capture common sentiment, do you? This is a place where there will be stronger opinions, more engagement, and more nostalgia too.

At any rate, I don't own a Switch, I've only played the games with my nephew. I'm only observing the commentary I see from friends and family around me, and the less Nintendo-dedicated reaction.

Side note: have you played Tunic? You may like that!

Re: The downfall of National Geographic

#83

Post by dylan604 »

varjag wrote: post #77
dylan604 wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How much of this is due to not having the internet during the time NatGeo's heyday? During that time, the only way accessible to see that kind of content was with their magazine. That was also a time before 24/7 channels of content. Today, there are so many documentaries, TV shows, TV channels, YouTube channels, streaming platforms, websites all offering some form of content similar to NatGeo (if some of it wasn't di…

They used to send full fledged expeditions, with authors, science experts and world renowned photographers on board. To most extreme and dramatic places: deserts, jungle, active warzones, mountaintops, the Arctic and so on. Which produced really in-depth reports with great penmanship often accompanied by masterpieces of photography. And while the world is much better traveled now it's rarely done by well funded teams…

These other content producers are doing the same things with perhaps the exception of writers. Look at the expeditions BBC has done to have an excuse to use Attenborough. Netflix has a few series doing similar. These expeditions haven't gone away, just their presentation in this format has.

Re: The downfall of National Geographic

#84

Post by indymike »

lachlan_gray wrote: post #54

I found a heap of their magazines from the 60’s and 70’s in the recycling at my university, and boy are they a good read. I think one reason they used to be so good (speculating) was that the internet didn’t exist. It was a medium where you could regularly learn out about distant things like peculiar mountain goats or an arctic tribe and get a firsthand report of it. Now there’s no shortage of interesting things like…

I think they lost their way when they made the foray into operating multiple TV channels. Suddenly, they went from slow, deep, content to having to have lots of content quickly all the time. I'd still be a subscriber, but the quality dropped significantly in the 00's.

Re: The downfall of National Geographic

#85

Post by clsec »

In the early 70's my grandparents gave me their collection of NG. It was complete from about 1920 to the early 1960's when my grandfather retired from the Air Force & built his own sail boat to travel the world. The discoveries I made, and the knowledge I gained, from that collection were awesome!

Re: The downfall of National Geographic

#86

Post by CPLX »

cagenut wrote: post #16

Nearly every single newspaper and magazine company has the exact same revenue and subscriber growth chart over the last 20 years. Its a roughly 30-degree angle down and to the right, from a high around 2000 to todays near bankrupcy across the board. Everybody got laid off, everything is produced by freelancers hitting wordcount and postcount metrics by the hour. There's nothing special about NatGeo here, Time, Newswe…

A much more accurate description of what's actually happened is that all the profits of the news media industry were captured by an oligarchy that was able to successfully (and illegally) take over and dominate the market for digital advertising.

There's quite a bit of money in online media and quite a bit of demand for it, including the type of reported media described here. Not all of it, and not every model works in the internet era, but enough to matter and make the story look very different than it does today absent actual illegal conduct.

Due to anti-competitive behavior, various forms of advertising fraud, and obvious violations of various antitrust laws, basically all the money was siphoned off to make people at Google and Facebook rich.

Worth noting that the point of view I'm outlining here is not some old man screaming conspiracy theories, it's the official point of view of the United State Department of Justice:

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-sues-googl...

Decent explainer:

https://montrealgazette.com/opinion/google-is-stealing-from-...

As a general life heuristic, every time you see someone saying "well yeah that's just like the natural way the market works nothingcouldabeendoneaboutit" you should be highly, highly suspicious.

Re: The downfall of National Geographic

#87

Post by zagrebian »

> With the advent of digital media, the meticulously curated, visually spectacular, and deeply researched articles of National Geographic appear to have fallen out of favor.

I’ve been reading NGM for decades. The content is still top notch in the latest issues. It’s as good as it’s ever been.

Re: The downfall of National Geographic

#88

Post by pharrington »

hospitalJail wrote: post #80
pharrington wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guarantee that I, and most other people who fawn over the two newest Zeldas aren't doing so because of manufactured hype.

That is a strong claim. Especially when Nintendo marketed to us as a child. We might just be accepting it because we have nostalgia for the characters. I remember people saying TP was the greatest game of all time. That aged poorly too.

The strong claim is that I, and most people, actually enjoy what we say we enjoy? That is dangerous levels of cynicism.

Re: The downfall of National Geographic

#89

Post by ghaff »

lachlan_gray wrote: post #54

I found a heap of their magazines from the 60’s and 70’s in the recycling at my university, and boy are they a good read. I think one reason they used to be so good (speculating) was that the internet didn’t exist. It was a medium where you could regularly learn out about distant things like peculiar mountain goats or an arctic tribe and get a firsthand report of it. Now there’s no shortage of interesting things like…

The internet didn't exist and travel, perhaps especially exotic/adventure travel, was a much more rarified thing--so National Geographic was this window into a world that the vast majority of people would never encounter anywhere else.

Re: The downfall of National Geographic

#90

Post by jimmychoozyx »

JohnFen wrote: post #34
cagenut wrote: post #16

Nearly every single newspaper and magazine company has the exact same revenue and subscriber growth chart over the last 20 years. Its a roughly 30-degree angle down and to the right, from a high around 2000 to todays near bankrupcy across the board. Everybody got laid off, everything is produced by freelancers hitting wordcount and postcount metrics by the hour. There's nothing special about NatGeo here, Time, Newswe…

> It makes sense that often the old things have to die for the new things to truly take over the ecological niche. The real problem is when the old things die and nothing has really filled their niche. NG is a good example, I think.

> nothing has really filled their niche

Traditional media has become replaced by Social media.

A good Youtube Adventure film, such as a tour of a beach town or historic town, a safari documentary, or a foodie tour, scratches my adventure itch quite well-- along the same vein as a magazine article, yet a film feels more sensory-immersive.

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