[Windswept]

I read quite a few different online news sites, but I'd be interested to hear what news sites some of you read that you might recommend.

I love getting a different angle on news events. Actually, I'm most surprised that many of the sites have very similar news reports, *without* a noticeably different angle of looking at the news events. Maybe I just haven't been reading the right sites.

I've just started branching out, looking for more sites to add to my list. I would read a lot more, but it does take a ton of time.

If you suggest a news site, perhaps you could mention if it has a particular political bent, and who generally reads it - like mainstream average readers, or whatever.

I'd also be interested to find out what British newspapers and news sites many of you read, as well as which British newspapers and sites you *don't* like, and *why*.

Thanks for any replies.

[turbulentfurball]

Originally Posted by Windswept I'd also be interested to find out what British newspapers and news sites many of you read, as well as which British newspapers and sites you *don't* like, and *why*.

When it comes to watching TV news, I quite like Sky News (Fox's UK partner), perhaps even more than the BBC. Sky seem to be faster on picking up on breaking news stories, especially around major events. I'm not sure if that's actually the case but it seems that way. When it comes to the internet, however, I avoid Sky's advertisement ridden website completely and use only the BBC. The BBC website is (obviously) completely devoid of commercial adverts (promotion of BBC programmes aside), and as a result, their pages are cleaner, faster to load, and seem a whole lot more genuine. The BBC's articles seem about the right length too. When it comes to reading online news, prefer the articles not to be too long; I'll leave in depth analysis of whatever is happening to the newspaper in the morning.

[Windswept]

Thank you for your input.

You make a good point. The 'front pages' of some of the online sites are actually difficult to read because it seems they spend most of their effort cramming in so many ads that the news articles are hard to find. And when you 'do' find lists of news articles, they're sometimes in microscopic print.

The Fox news online site is just the biggest pain in the a$$ in that regard.

And don't even get me started on the animated ads that are everywhere! God, I do hate those so very much. I can't imagine how anyone with Attention Deficit Disorder manages to deal with those.

In fact, I'm beginning to wonder if *I* have ADD, because the moving ads just infuriate and completely distract me from reading any given news article. I literally have to cover the ad with my hand or a post-it-note.

[Yonzie]

The Inquirer - British IT tabloid. Wonderful humour and most of what they write come true in the end, even if it's speculation.
The Brussels Journal - Don't really know how to characterize it... Often a bit rascist, but thought provoking. They talk a lot about muslims and civil unrest in Europe. More commentary than news.

[turbulentfurball]

I'm quite interested to find out what's the most popular website for news is internationally. The best I could do was Google trends, and it appears that the BBC is rated higher than CNN or Fox News for searches.

[billybobsky]

BBC -- Dominion.

CBS/Fox -- US.

[Windswept]

When I say I've been branching out, I really mean that.

I had heard that Ahmadinejad, the leader of Iran, had a blog, so I found it and bookmarked it yesterday. I haven't had a chance to do any reading there yet, but I do have to say that the "angle" on news that I mentioned earlier is pretty much the complete polar opposite at his site... at least from just the cursory glance that I was able to give it so far, and going by the poll that I participated in.

http://www.ahmadinejad.ir/

Here is a poll from his blog:

In your viewpoint, is it just as the present structure of the United Nation; only some powerful countries and the winners of the Second World War, have the right to veto? Yes No

And his most recent blog entry:

Gifts From Visitors 2006/10/16 Numerous letters, which are written by people to me everyday, contain remarks, suggestions and effective criticism and I know them like divine blessing. In one of recent examples, a message from one of readers contained a valuable point about government trip to different provinces. Recommend by a young person who only mentioned his name, created an effective shift in administrative process of next government’s prudential trips. I , as the nation,s representative, appreciate and thank dear Mohammad and also other home mates that grant theirs notes and suggestions to ninth government and probably never will know that how they became the origin of a positive change. I ask Almighty God that holy month of Ramadan be gushing of bless, grace and abundance for our nice and patient nation of our dear county, Iran. I also hope people don’t deprive their servants from praying, in these days which are the time of materialization of a prayer and especially in holy nights of Ghadr. Written by Mahmood Ahmadinejad at 15:55

I've also briefly checked out al-jazeera, but I can tell that familiarizing myself with 'that' site will take a LOT of time, so I won't go there unless I have plenty of time for reading. I was very surprised to find 'normal' news articles there, with the exact same stories as everywhere else, written in the same matter-of-fact manner. I guess I didn't expect that.

http://english.aljazeera.net/HomePage

[Moogs]

BBC for anything international because none of the media outlets in this country can be trusted to report things fully / not to omit little details, etc.

Tribune online for local, NYT for national.

[World Leader Pretend]

I like NPR's website, but NPR's Morning Edition on the radio is great for catching up on current events in 30 minutes.

[PKIDelirium]

I just use CNN and Yahoo News.

[Moogs]

Bad idea. Both are nearly useless.

[torifile]

Boing Boing has the occasional interesting article. Slate.com is also a good site. Neither are "news" sites but more just commentary on the news.

[Windswept]

Okay, how is The Australian viewed in terms of political bent? Does it have a general, widespread readership?

I just clicked on that site and found this headline and the following article listings:

Muslim leader blames women for sex attacks THE nation's most senior Muslim cleric has blamed immodestly dressed women who don't wear Islamic headdress for being preyed on by men and likened them to abandoned "meat" that attracts voracious animals. * Politicians and ethnic groups express outrage * Mufti was not talking about rape: associate * Cleric should be sacked and deported: Goward * Prove speech made in Ramadan: Muslim group

I haven't read the story yet, but it was a pretty eye-opening headline and intro.

Also, wrt UK media, I've visited The Times news site, and I expected to be impressed, but I wasn't. I can't quite put my finger on it, but the site seemed very ordinary, a let-down from what I had anticipated. The newspaper is held in high esteem, isn't it?

How about The Telegraph? Where does it stand wrt journalistic esteem? What kind of readership? Political bent?

I've found some very interesting articles there that I didn't encounter at the BBC, so I was wondering what kind of paper it is considered?

Wrt the BBC, I guess it hadn't occurred to me that it lacked ads. How strange that I hadn't noticed that, because I hate the ads everywhere else.

One thing I like about the ABC news site is that it has lots of polls ( ), and they're easy to find (the word "Vote" in bold). You can usually find at least six polls on the front page. I think polls are fun.

I'm pretty sure there are quite a few polls at the Fox site, but aside from Neil Cavuto's on the front page, it's like mission impossible to find the rest.

[Paul]

http://www.reddit.com

I get all my news there.

Anytime there is a big story it is voted up and I see it right away. There are also some occasional gems that you won't really find anywhere else on the web. It is amazing. Some of the commentary rivals PO too! (And is extremely intelligent.)

[Perfecting_Zero]

Hi Windswept,

I include al-jazeera in my sweep of world news. And it's also interesting to read coverage of US news and events, but from an Arab perspective.

Like you, I enjoy a diversity of viewpoints.



Cheers,

Z


http://english.aljazeera.net/HomePage

[Dave]

I usually read (and watch) both Fox and CNN. I get my liberal bias from one, my conservative bias from the other, and figure that they average out to fair and balanced.

[AsLan^]

I get almost all my news from PoliticalOutsider

[AWR]

First I look at The Guardian, a UK newspaper on the left in the political spectrum. http://www.guardian.co.uk/

Its web site is great. Not only do they have very up to date, as it happens, international news, but tons of excellent Sports, Arts, Science, Travel, etc. coverage.

I like the Guardian because they don't seem to simply regurgitate what the powers that be say. They typically examine what's been said in the context of what's been said before and the facts (as they see them, of course). Articles tend to be on the longer side, taking a more indepth look at a story.

I do watch my way there though, as some of the writer's on the staff are bit too much tin-foil hat for my taste. Most of the writers I find excellent.

I also look at the NYTimes, Washington Post and Financial Times (office hardcopy).

I'm surprised in my own way that "people" consider CNN liberal. Superficial, usually. Inept, sometimes. But liberal? Perhaps to a US audience. I find it very middle of the road. I also find the content extremely light on analysis. Toothless.

[digitaldave]

The Onion .

[Barto]

Windswept, The Australian is a Murdoch paper and its articles are a subset of those on News.com.au. The trick with The Oz (as it is known) is to ignore the editorials. They are sometimes left, sometimes right, and 99% of the time crazy. The news content is reasonably timely and accurate.

Apart from News.com.au and the BBC, I read Dvorak Uncensored (down right now).

The Sheik al-Hilaly story is huge in Australia right now, it's amazing that Australia's most well known Muslim leader would make such reprehensible statements.

[AWR]

Originally Posted by Barto The Sheik al-Hilaly story is huge in Australia right now, it's amazing that Australia's most well known Muslim leader would make such reprehensible statements.

How bout The Age, down under. It seems a sensible enough news source.

http://www.theage.com.au/news/nation...749243241.html

[joveblue]

The Australian: Is the only newspaper distributed country-wide. It's a bit hard to tell where it stands because the editorials are a bit all over the place (and generally not particularly sensible). I don't read it though so I can't comment to much. I think it's generally regarded as a bit right-wing. The fact that it's owned by Rupert Murdoch would be enough to turn me off.

By the way, that headline isn't the shocking thing, it's the actual story itself which is shocking:

"If you take out uncovered meat and place it outside on the street, or in the the garden or in the park, or in the backyard without a cover, and the cats come and eat it ... whose fault is it, the cats or the uncovered meat," he said. "The uncovered meat is the problem. If she was in her room, in her home, in her hijab, no problem would have occurred."


In Australia I would reccomend The Age, in Melbourne. This newspaper is generally regarded as a little bit left-wing. It's aimed at people who are more intelligent than average, and has a high level of integrity. Or in Sydney, The Sydney Morning Herald is quite similar to The Age (same owner, etc.)

Newspolls: they might be fun, but don't pay any attention to the results, they're like the opposite of science.

[Dorian Gray]

The Guardian has adapted well to the new-media age, as opposed to most newspapers. So they offer the entire contents of the newspaper on their website, free of charge, with a minimal amount of advertising and none of those hideous pop-up ads that you must view for a few seconds before a close button appears. (I just checked the Fox News website to see what you mean: wow!) The Guardian is also a well-written paper with plenty of original analysis, so it's generally a good read. I particularly like George Monbiot, though perhaps he's a bit too tin-foil hat for AWR! (Monbiot's great book The Age of Consent is a valid replacement for Marx's Communist Manifesto.)

I also very much like Jonathan Freedland, who incidentally spent a lot of time in the USA and among other things backs a more US-style constitution for the UK (as evidenced by his contribution to the The Rape of the Constitution?: "The superstitious nonsense of a constitution written in invisible ink, which so incensed Thomas Paine, is still with us, exerting the same effect now as it did then – casting government as the exclusive preserve of a set of initiates. We need to assert that this is our country; we have a right to see the rules by which it is organised.").

In the UK the following papers are popular across the country:

The Sun: owned by the Dirty Digger, largest circulation in the UK, unmitigated rubbish for the barely literate, used to support the Conservatives, but since Blair has outflanked the Conservatives it has turned to supporting New Labour.

The Daily Mail: middle-market paper aimed at the more self-respecting blue-collar workers and the lower echelons of Britain's middle classes, consisting mostly of hysterical far-right ranting, sexist and racist to the core, much given to breathlessly lamenting the slide of society into decadence while endorsing the very fiscal policies that deny society exists in the first place. In short, utterly inane.

The Daily Express: competitor to the Daily Mail, historically tending more to the left of centre, but in the past few years has slid back into the mud of trying to out-gun the Mail in the trenches of the far right. Is owned by Richard Desmond, famous for his portfolio of pornography assets including the most-watched porn TV station in the UK.

The Daily Telegraph: bills itself as "Read a bestseller every day" due to its having the highest circulation of any broadsheet in the UK. Has clung to the broadsheet format while the other serious papers moved to more compact formats, probably because its format is its highest claim to seriousness. The writing itself is often sensational and hardly above the middle-market papers, often tending to "rant" and dealing with a lot of celebrity gossip. Right of centre.

The Times: also owned by the Dirty Digger, ancient newspaper that was much respected in the past but is today viewed with suspicion by many because of its increasing tendency to skew news towards a neo-con perspective. Right-wing and usually capable of presenting a well-argued case for such a stance. Very old reader profile because it is stuck in the past in many senses: for example, giving undue respect to ancient (and often harmful) traditions.

The Financial Times: very, very sharp analysis of current events. Aimed at the very top of the market, with no concessions made for stupid readers. Unrepentantly capitalist but aware that market regulation is important. I find its coverage of EU institutions particularly incisive.

The Independent: politically progressive paper aimed at the well-educated and internationally aware. Has instigated a lot of the change in the Fourth Estate with new formats, new editorial policies, and new ideas in general. Is a good read but I prefer the Guardian.

The websites of the above newspapers will reflect their dead tree perspectives.

There are also a bunch of other big tabloids which are not worth mentioning and some good Scottish papers which are worth mentioning but which I don't know very well. One of the Scots might fill us in.

However, for true, internet-style reporting on international issues it's hard to beat ZNet. They have many great contributors including famous people like Chomsky, Robert Fisk, John Pilger, Arundhati Roy, etc. Great site.

[autodata]

Google News. Prevents getting stuck on one source.

[torifile]

Again, not "news" but news-ish. dailykos. I'm sure that doesn't surprise anyone here. Also, I've been reading the Huffington Post lately. It's surprisingly unbiased. It doesn't just cover politics, though political stories are the lionshare of articles.

[AWR]

Originally Posted by Dorian Gray [snip] I particularly like George Monbiot, though perhaps he's a bit too tin-foil hat for AWR!

Exactly! Monbiot throws the baby out with the bath water in almost every one of his pieces. I find myself saying good point, good point, good point, DAMN, what an idiot.

And he's so bloody pleased with himself.

Roy is another one who I think gets in over her head, so to speak.

I also very much like Jonathan Freedland

Yes, me too. Excellent stuff on Iraq.


Thanks for the run down on the other UK papers, with the exception of the FT and Sun, I was in need of a crash course on English papers.

[Stone Of Love]

Originally Posted by Dave I usually read (and watch) both Fox and CNN. I get my liberal bias from one, my conservative bias from the other, and figure that they average out to fair and balanced.

Let me know when you find some "liberal bias" on one of those sites!!

[ast3r3x]

shortnews.com all the interesting news

google.com/news for everything else

[Fahrenheit]

Originally Posted by turbulentfurball When it comes to watching TV news, I quite like Sky News (Fox's UK partner), perhaps even more than the BBC. Sky seem to be faster on picking up on breaking news stories, especially around major events. I'm not sure if that's actually the case but it seems that way. When it comes to the internet, however, I avoid Sky's advertisement ridden website completely and use only the BBC. The BBC website is (obviously) completely devoid of commercial adverts (promotion of BBC programmes aside), and as a result, their pages are cleaner, faster to load, and seem a whole lot more genuine. The BBC's articles seem about the right length too. When it comes to reading online news, prefer the articles not to be too long; I'll leave in depth analysis of whatever is happening to the newspaper in the morning.

Hmm RE: Sky being more upto date, I would have to on one level agree, but on the other hand say that BBC News is almost always just after it, but the BBC are normally more careful to clarify things before going live.

We must remember also, that unlike even CNN, the BBC has a media station based on nearly every country on Earth, and is pretty much the only way to go for International News.

[Mugge]

Just a quick tour:

http://www.jyllandsposten.dk
The infamous Danish daily. Also the most levelheaded newspaper in Denmark and currently sponsoring a grand sea expedition around the world: http://www.galathea.nu/default.asp

http://www.borsen.dk
Main source for Danish business news.

http://www.ft.com
Part of the job, but a nice part.

http://www.iht.com
Old habit that doesn't really have a reason to go away.

http://www.arstechnica.com
Tech explained in a way I can understand and not afraid of taking a political stand.

http://www.theregister.co.uk
They always seem to have a funny angle, if not an EU angle.

http://www.bbc.co.uk
Better than CNN.