For on-line news, what sites do you avoid and which ones do you seek out as being trustworthy?
Thanks to my position as an editor on SoylentNews, I've had the privilege of viewing story submissions which have referenced a veritable plethora of different sources. It has been a privilege to serve you these past few years. My goal has been to provide stories that cover a diversity of areas but always with an attempt to provide level-headed background. I strive to avoid shrill in-your-face!!!!elevnty! diatribes. To invoke a common mis-quotation "Just the facts, ma'am." Full confession: I'm not above posting an occasional funny or feel-good story, either.
Over time, I've come to learn that some sources are more reputable than others. News outlets are comprised of people who have their own biases; some try to remain objective whereas others use their position to push an agenda.
For example, I've learned here that RT is a mouthpiece for the Russian government (A modern-day Pravda, if you will).
The BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation), on the other hand, is funded primarily through a television license costing £147 per year per household. But, it has received a funding boost from government to expand its global reach.
Fox News has had complaints about its content and has had its share of controversies. But even some commonly-held beliefs about Fox News have proved exaggerated and not fully supported by the facts.
ScienceDaily, phys.org, CNET, Quora, NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration), ESA (European Space Agency), Spaceflight Now, weather.gov, and Hurricane Prediction Center are just some of the sites that I have found especially helpful.
So, I turn to the SoylentNews community:
Bonus question: What would you think of a news story on SoylentNews whose only supporting link is CNN? Fox News? Breitbart?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by HiThere on Saturday December 29 2018, @12:07AM
It's not just a shift in how news is paid for...unless you interpret that pretty widely. A large part of the problem is an increased concentration of ownership...the editor may not be "controlled", but he generally knows what those who hired him want said. Another element is the increased focus on news that can't be checked locally. Local papers used to focus on local news, but since being bought up by chains, the same story will run word for word the same on the entire chain of papers. That's not local news. It usually isn't even news from the same city, and often not news from the same state. It's true I don't have a great deal of interest in the scores of the local high school basketball team...but at least that news was usually reliable, and it could be (and was) checked by those with first hand knowledge.
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