What should be the alternative to newspapers?
1531 sats \ 28 comments \ @Tef 6 May alter_native
I read this comment of Charles Baudelaire on newspapers and I wanted to share it with you. I strongly agree with him.
He writes:
It is impossible to glance through any newspaper, no matter what the day, the month, or the year, without finding on every line the most frightful traces of human perversity, together with the most astonishing boasts of probity, charity, and benevolence and the most brazen statements regarding the progress of civilization.
Every journal, from the first line to the last, is nothing but a tissue of horrors. Wars, crimes, thefts, lecheries, tortures, the evil deeds of princes, of nations, of private individuals; an orgy of universal atrocity.
And it is with this loathsome appetizer that civilized man daily washes down his morning repast. Everything in this world oozes crime: the newspaper, the street wall, and the human countenance.
I am unable to comprehend how a man of honor could take a newspaper in his hands without a shudder of disgust.
Charles Baudelaire, Intimate Journals, translated by Isherwood (San Francisco: City Lights Books, 1990), p. 91.
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85 sats \ 4 replies \ @k00b 6 May
I'd love to see some substack-like site allow readers to aggregate several writers into a newspaper. The margins are too slim to expect them to produce physical newspapers, but there's something special about aimless, non-self-centered discovery that the internet has grown to lack.
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162 sats \ 0 replies \ @StillStackinAfterAllTheseYears 6 May
It's not quite the same thing, but Matter has served me well as an aggregator for different newsletters (not just limited to Substack or one platform). That said, it's more of an RSS variant than a newspaper in feel.
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20 sats \ 0 replies \ @siggy47 6 May freebie
Yes. I always used to play around with those news aggregator home pages, but none of them ever seemed to fulfill their potential. I tried flip board and a couple of others too.
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10 sats \ 0 replies \ @lawndough 6 May
Sounds like Flipboard
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16 sats \ 0 replies \ @037447d9ca 6 May
It's called RSS.
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205 sats \ 0 replies \ @justin_shocknet 6 May
What is a news paper but a curation of written articles?
Their flaw however was in the obstacle of physical distribution, something quite costly, geo-bound, making it difficult for new entrants to compete. Thus, an industry prone to capture by those who use narratives as a weapon.
The internet has somewhat obviated this, but not completely. The distributors of the internet, companies operating servers and databases and UX designers, became the new curators. A hybrid of technical and social engineering dug moats of "network effect"
Email lists and RSS feeds have long offered independent distribution, but self-curation with these is a tedious after-thought in their design.
The unfiltered noise of Nostr may however be the pendulum swinging back by showing us the need for curation. A permissionless and cost-nominal standard for distribution breaks legacy network-effects, and in so doing illustrates our dependence on filters.
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10 sats \ 0 replies \ @guts 6 May
More than better newspaper we need better journalism. You can't if you are censored or killed. So a decentralized and anonymous outlet for real journalism.
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36 sats \ 4 replies \ @Coinsreporter 6 May
If you ask me, I would say SN is the best alternative. We just need to have a full fledged ~news territory where many stackers post daily news and analysis.
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16 sats \ 0 replies \ @Satosora 6 May
We need more territories in general. Sometimes I think of something, but then I cant figure out which territory to put it under. When I was first starting, posting cost weighed in a bit. lol
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10 sats \ 1 reply \ @Tef OP 6 May
Yes, I also think it is the best alternative. Once it was a ~news territory here, but not anymore.
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Coinsreporter 6 May
I know this but as I said we need a full fledged News territory with sub territories
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Malachi17 9 May
I'd manage the territory if I had the funding. ;)
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5 sats \ 0 replies \ @Satosora 6 May
I think everyone remembers their father or mother handing them the comic section. I remember reading it with my brothers and getting a chuckle at some of them!
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20 sats \ 3 replies \ @siggy47 6 May
I think we already have our substitutes: social media apps, podcasts, youtubers, etc.
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54 sats \ 0 replies \ @Satosora 6 May
I think they might be for the younger generation. I still see newspapers out and about. Especially laying down on the countertop at my work.
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54 sats \ 1 reply \ @Tef OP 6 May
Do you think social media is better than newspapers?
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @siggy47 6 May
Only to the extent that there is more than one source of information, no matter how coopted the platform is.
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10 sats \ 1 reply \ @0xbitcoiner 6 May
I think people like to hear about others misfortunes to feel like their own life isn't so bad after all.
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Tef OP 6 May
I agree!
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10 sats \ 3 replies \ @oliverweiss 6 May
Internet.
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0 sats \ 2 replies \ @Satosora 6 May
The internet doesnt give you the same experience. Crinkling the paper, running your hands on the pages. Washing your hands afterwards because the ink bled on your hands.
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15 sats \ 1 reply \ @oliverweiss 6 May
Irrespective of what Charles Baudelaire said, I don’t see any bright future for the printed newspapers.
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Satosora 6 May
No doubt it is going away and will disappear. But there will be niche markets for it. Things never disappear forever!
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Undergotten 7 May
What's a newspaper?
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @kilianbuhn 6 May
It seems like society has already decided that. Social media, websites, podcasts...
It's up to you to decide what you find worth your attention. There absolutely are more reasonable and more delulu 🌪️ voices out there...
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Satosora 6 May
There is something soothing with opening a newspaper and just going through it on a weekend. Just reading and observing the world around you, with a nice cup of coffee. Being amazed at all the joy in the world...and all the fear that is being pushed.
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @IamSINGLE 6 May
Let's make SN a kind of Newspaper. Can we?
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @030e0dca83 6 May
Telegram is always a substitute to newspapers
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