WTFCNN

I’ve been thinking that same thing about CNN — WTF? Here’s a site with some of the more absurd headlines from CNN lately, but even without the news about how Bono’s neighbors’ smoke is bothering him or tips on how you can live in a spaceship (both, sadly, actual headlines), I’ve felt that CNN on the Web has gotten painfully bad (not to mention gems on television like Anderson Cooper 360, because, as everyone knows, he is The Mole.) The most egregious problem I’ve noticed lately is the ridiculous inclusion of articles written by advertising partners like CareerBuilder.com — while there are notes that they’re written by business partners, they’re packaged and formatted like any other articles on the site — painful, painful bias.)

I keep checking CNN for my news mostly from habit and muscle memory, but need to find something better. I think what I’m looking for has these characteristics:

  • broad & international — I’m interested in all of it — worldwide news, but also US sports, entertainment, business, tech, etc
  • not too overwhelming — the CNN.com home page is about the right number of articles
  • no advertiser-based editorial bias/inclusion of articles by advertisers
  • ideally, edited by humans

I’m looking for something that’s coherent, too — not an aggregate reporting like Digg or Google News.

Any favorites?

This entry was posted on Monday, March 17th, 2008 at 9:15 am and is filed under The Internets. You can follow any comments to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

23 comments

  1. Ryan Doherty
    March 17, 2008 at 9:23 am

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/ ? I use it when I get fed up with CNN. Usually has a non-US bias and some pretty good reporting. BBC also does a good job of providing context and history to most articles.

  2. lilly
    March 17, 2008 at 10:43 am

    I first lost faith in CNN during their non-stop coverage of the Jon Benet Ramsey case 8ish years ago. Lewinski fest didn’t help either. Back then, I thanked the stars for Google News. Now Goog News is also old somehow…

  3. Ryan Doherty
    March 17, 2008 at 9:23 am

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/ ? I use it when I get fed up with CNN. Usually has a non-US bias and some pretty good reporting. BBC also does a good job of providing context and history to most articles.

  4. lilly
    March 17, 2008 at 10:43 am

    I first lost faith in CNN during their non-stop coverage of the Jon Benet Ramsey case 8ish years ago. Lewinski fest didn’t help either. Back then, I thanked the stars for Google News. Now Goog News is also old somehow…

  7. gen
    March 17, 2008 at 4:56 pm

    I find it best to go to Europe for my news on the US. BBC & FT, FTW.

    I also read my home town rag, the NYT.

  8. gen
    March 17, 2008 at 4:56 pm

    I find it best to go to Europe for my news on the US. BBC & FT, FTW.

    I also read my home town rag, the NYT.

  9. npr
    March 17, 2008 at 7:13 pm

    why not nytimes?

    seems so obvious that you must have a reason…

  10. John
    March 17, 2008 at 8:29 pm

    NYT is good, and something i track, but not so good with pop culture or sports or tech, really. i’m sorta lowbrow in my pop culture — maybe i should just start checking ew.com.

  11. John
    March 17, 2008 at 8:29 pm

    but doesn’t it seem strange that there aren’t really good answers here?

  12. Sam
    March 17, 2008 at 8:59 pm

    Surprisingly, I’ve been impressed with MSNBC lately. Their clean website helps, but the articles are well written as well and the occasional video is nice too. I’d highly recommend it and that’s not something I would’ve said a year ago.

  13. npr
    March 17, 2008 at 7:13 pm

    why not nytimes?

    seems so obvious that you must have a reason…

  14. John
    March 17, 2008 at 8:29 pm

    NYT is good, and something i track, but not so good with pop culture or sports or tech, really. i’m sorta lowbrow in my pop culture — maybe i should just start checking ew.com.

  15. John
    March 17, 2008 at 8:29 pm

    but doesn’t it seem strange that there aren’t really good answers here?

  16. Sam
    March 17, 2008 at 8:59 pm

    Surprisingly, I’ve been impressed with MSNBC lately. Their clean website helps, but the articles are well written as well and the occasional video is nice too. I’d highly recommend it and that’s not something I would’ve said a year ago.

  17. Gary
    March 18, 2008 at 7:37 am

    I was also going to suggest BBC. I guess Topix.com is a little disparate (if that’s a word and if I spelled it correctly). But it’s interesting to search by zip code and see all the sources and feeds that pop up.

    Topix.com’s user comments quickly devolve into flame wars, though. Best avoided.

  18. Gary
    March 18, 2008 at 7:37 am

    I was also going to suggest BBC. I guess Topix.com is a little disparate (if that’s a word and if I spelled it correctly). But it’s interesting to search by zip code and see all the sources and feeds that pop up.

    Topix.com’s user comments quickly devolve into flame wars, though. Best avoided.

  21. Tao
    March 24, 2008 at 5:15 pm

    What about Al Jazeera? I find it presents an honest overview for world news.

  22. Tao
    March 24, 2008 at 5:15 pm

    What about Al Jazeera? I find it presents an honest overview for world news.

  23. kourtkaj
    October 24, 2008 at 4:36 pm

    Thanks for sharing
    best regards

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