this post was submitted on 28 Mar 2024

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The slow death of Twitter is measured in disasters like the Baltimore bridge collapse (www.vox.com)

submitted 7 months ago by jeffw@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world

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Twitter, now X, was once a useful site for breaking news. The Baltimore bridge collapse shows those days are long gone.

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[–] Minotaur@lemm.ee 211 points 7 months ago (29 children)

It’s actually crazy how low the percentage of people under like… forty is now that actually gets their news direct from a news site. Seriously, i don’t know a single person from like 20-35 who actually just goes on the NPR or C-SPAN app or whatever.

It kind of sucks. So much news is just reading the headline and seeing a photo now. And I just feel like there’s something bad about being able to see a comment section on Twitter or Reddit or even Lemmy now on every news event. Makes for a lot more group think rather than just reading the news and going “huh”

[–] Shake747@lemmy.dbzer0.com 90 points 7 months ago (10 children)

Sometimes there's good discussion though, and it's good to hear different takes.

Having comments also gives less power to the writer, like could you imagine if we all took Fox News or CNN headlines at face value and didn't discuss them?

[–] remotedev@lemmy.ca 39 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Yea, you can't just read the news and go huh. anymore, because the news is no longer "this is what happened." Now it's "OMG YOU WON'T BELIEVE THIS YOU'RE GONNA HATE THAT this happened AND EVERYONE IS PISSED"

[–] Minotaur@lemm.ee 16 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Actually it’s really not at all. You’re probably just thinking about Reddit/lemmy/twitter posts when you write that.

Go on like NPR or C Span and actually read the news. It’s fine.

[–] catloaf@lemm.ee 25 points 7 months ago (1 children)

The number of those news outlets is shrinking, though. It used to be that every city had a local paper with real news. Now they're all part of a media conglomerate and do the bare minimum of actual journalism.

[–] mojofrododojo@lemmy.world 7 points 7 months ago

support NPR and it's journalism across the US. Support your local station. And support local papers (not ganett rags and conglomerates).

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[–] Stovetop@lemmy.world 45 points 7 months ago (6 children)

So much news is just reading the headline and seeing a photo now.

Mexico's new president: 3-year-old Alfredo Pequeño Lobo becomes nation's youngest elected and first canine leader. But can he be rough on the cartels?

[–] bradorsomething@ttrpg.network 22 points 7 months ago (1 children)

The term may be 4 years but it will feel like 28 for him.

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[–] Potatos_are_not_friends@lemmy.world 12 points 7 months ago

Oh my I'm so invested in this story now.

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[–] space@lemmy.dbzer0.com 26 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (1 children)

I'm guilty of doing this (just reading the headlines) as well. I usually do it for these reasons:

I don't care enough to want to read more. For example, news about US politics. I don't live in the US. I feel that reading the headlines is enough to keep me informed about what's happening, but I really don't care any more than that.
The details aren't valuable to me. For example, the Apple anti-trust lawsuit... Is it important? Yes. I'm already well aware of the horrible anticonsumer practices of Apple. But do I need to know all the particular details about the lawsuit? Not really. In fact, the only thing that matters is the final verdict, which hasn't happened yet.
I care, but I already know enough details.
I don't feel like the article would bring a lot of value, especially if the title is click-baity. I've encountered too many articles that are void of content, just the title repeated in 10x more words.

I don't like visiting news sites because, in addition to all of them being obnoxious and ad riddled, I feel like I'm wasting a lot of time reading long articles that could be rewritten as 3 bullet points. On platforms like lemmy, users will highlight the important bits in the comments which saves a lot of time.

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[–] stoly@lemmy.world 22 points 7 months ago (4 children)

That’s what places like Lemmy are for though.

[–] VeganCheesecake@lemmy.blahaj.zone 11 points 7 months ago

Great for seeing a headline and then finding an article yourself. Less great for finding articles. Half of you people here have a penchant for linking super weird news sources.

[–] T156@lemmy.world 10 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Even Lemmy does that, though. You're still influenced by the headline, the community/moderation and the users.

Assuming that everyone clicks through to the article, and doesn't comment before reading the headline, anyhow.

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[–] Thorny_Insight@lemm.ee 8 points 7 months ago (7 children)

Lemmy is massively biased though. While that doesn't mean the articles aren't factual, you're still only ever hearing one side of the story. What I find time after time is that majority of people who have strong opinions about current events are completely uncapable of fairly steelmanning the opposing side's argument.

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[–] Cethin@lemmy.zip 11 points 7 months ago (2 children)

I think the bigger issue is how bad news sites have gotten. I'm sure part of the reason for that is people getting news online from alternative sources, but mainstream sources are significantly worse than they once were which just pushes things further in that direction.

That said, I don't know which caused more group-think. Was it having a few mainstream sources and that's it or having many worse quality but more diverse sources? People relate to the new version more probably, which encourages them to follow along and not think for themselves, but I don't know if that's better or worse than not really having any dissenting opinion available at all.

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[–] HaywardT@lemmy.sdf.org 11 points 7 months ago

You can find out the event from the news, but then get the facts from industry experts. It's much better these days.

[–] Thorny_Insight@lemm.ee 8 points 7 months ago (3 children)

That's how I get my news. I visit the Finnish equivalence of BBC once or twice a day and that's my news diet. If they don't report on it, I don't need to know. Something like what a VOX journalist thinks about Twitter I couldn't care less so I don't even bother reading it. I'm proudly unaware of most of the things that non-serious news organizations report on.

[–] viking@infosec.pub 7 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Same for me with news from Germany. Technically tagesschau.de is a news magazine run by our largest public broadcaster and not the broadcaster itself, but it's the same thing really.

And then I casually browse news.google.com in German to skim over headlines that might not have made the mainstream news. My blocklist there features more than 200 "news" sites, so that I really get a curated feed of some 20-30 trustworthy ones.

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[–] OceanSoap@lemmy.ml 8 points 7 months ago

I use 1440, which sums up daily news in a fact-based way and leaves out all opinion. It's magical. It takes 10 minutes to read and I'm not bombarded by why "libtards are destroying america" or why "this ties back to trump destroying democracy" somehow.

Highly recommend it for daily news.

[–] Wahots@pawb.social 7 points 7 months ago (1 children)

I get my news from a paper and it is a decent blend of good and bad news. Quality journalism. I gift articles often just to kinda fight back against the whole title-and-picture-only news.

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[–] Ultraviolet@lemmy.world 7 points 7 months ago (1 children)

I'd read more articles if they weren't paywalled.

[–] fuckingkangaroos@lemm.ee 12 points 7 months ago (3 children)

APNews.com, relatively low bias, no paywall.

[–] Veraxus@lemmy.world 7 points 7 months ago

Try explaining that to a rightist, though. It’s not right-wing propaganda, therefore it is left-wing propaganda. 😔

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[–] Branch_Ranch@lemmy.world 7 points 7 months ago

A few months back, i subscribed to the news aggregator Ground News. Although there are more expensive options, i pay about $6/year and I love it. You get news stories from lots of different sites and gives you a good idea of biases. I highly recommend it!

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[–] alekwithak@lemmy.world 90 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (3 children)

I mean it was never actually a good place for news, aside from the top five trending stories, if you wanted infinite bad takes on them.

[–] Seraph@kbin.social 133 points 7 months ago (3 children)

I'd argue it was a good place for FAST news. For a lot of major events you can find posts and videos from users before the media releases anything, which is kind of a first for humanity at least in terms of accessibility.

Now, if you're looking for ACCURATE news...

[–] tal@lemmy.today 16 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Yeah, I'd say that it was useful to gather sources that had to be vetted for accuracy. Honestly, I'd also say it made a good source for the media, where they'd have the job of vetting it and putting out material with more delay but also more accuracy.

[–] otter@lemmy.ca 8 points 7 months ago

Yep I heard that it was great for journalists looking for info on a developing story. You could usually follow a hashtag around to find videos from different angles and witnesses to follow up with / interview.

Hopefully that builds up on the new platforms too

[–] Meron35@lemmy.world 10 points 7 months ago

Its specific speed/accuracy tradeoff made it a very good fit for news which you need to know quickly, but had low stakes if it was incorrect. A great example of this transit delays/cancellations, where you probably don't care about the specific reason why a train is delayed and just want alternative options asap.

It was often much more effective to directly follow transit agencies and/or workers for info, rather than use their official website.

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[–] Hypx@fedia.io 35 points 7 months ago (1 children)

It's no longer a good place for news, discussion, or even real opinions. It's just an echo chamber of hate and closed-mindedness, and increasingly just bots talking to each other.

[–] alekwithak@lemmy.world 12 points 7 months ago (2 children)

Right, and though it is certainly worse, my argument is that this was true before the rich brat bought it.

[–] DarthYoshiBoy@kbin.social 15 points 7 months ago (1 children)

It depends. In the early days of the Android ROM scene, Twitter was the best place for news. Cyanogen and all the crews basically announced their new releases exclusively on Twitter. There has been a similar vibe for other scenes over the years as well. Discord is largely taking over that space these days, but I miss the simplicity of following one or two people whose updates I cared about a bunch over the new reality where I'm in 30 Discords and they're all chock full of notifications for endless nonsense I care nothing about.

[–] alekwithak@lemmy.world 8 points 7 months ago

I mainly used XDA then, but you right. I had truly forgotten how nice it was around '10 - '11.

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[–] jeffw@lemmy.world 7 points 7 months ago

You could follow journalists you like or outlets though

[–] eldrichhydralisk@piefed.social 47 points 7 months ago (2 children)

The only reason I had a Twitter account was because there was an emergency event in my local area and Twitter was the one place I could get information about it right now. There were locals sharing what they knew, emergency services telling people what measures needed to be taken where, and journalists on the ground saying what they knew in real time. It was invaluable.

When I left Twitter, that ability to follow breaking news as it happens was the thing I was afraid I'd miss out on most. It's bittersweet to find out that I didn't need to worry about that after all.

[–] 2000mph@lemmy.world 7 points 7 months ago

Exactly, I was the same. This is the News that Twitter was good for, the live events.

I'd always check Twitter for the initial on the scene explanation of what was happening from local people. In my case it was a massive warehouse fire that I could see the smoke in the distance. Obviously there was nothing about it on the traditional news sites, but loads of stuff from local people on Twitter immediately.

Then afterwards you'd just read the proper News outlets for the full official details after the fact.

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[–] dumples@kbin.social 35 points 7 months ago (1 children)

The sudden influx of random racists on a local space after a tragedy is cliche at this point. They are just waiting in the wings to spread some nonsense and pretend to be from there.

[–] InternetUser2012@midwest.social 7 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Is it that or is it just bots and trolls? IF they are real people, I'm glad they have a platform to be on so they're recognized for who they really are. Some day, this will all catch up to them all.

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[–] kinkles@sh.itjust.works 29 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (5 children)

I used to get all my news from Reddit and I, unfortunately, fell into the habit of reading just the headline and then comments. After quitting I started looking for an healthy replacement to my news fix. I looked at many different RSS apps but many of them had monthly fees or the interface just sucked. Eventually I found an amazing one (iOS only) called feeeed that has been incredible. It’s free, no in-app purchases or ads, lovely interface, a simple reader mode, dark mode, and more. I really recommend it for anyone trying to quit Twitter/Reddit for news.

[–] PraiseTheSoup@lemm.ee 17 points 7 months ago (2 children)

I thought you said news. This just looks like spam?

[–] kinkles@sh.itjust.works 13 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

Yeah sorry, my subscriptions aren’t the best example of the content you can subscribe to. I mostly follow tech news and deals. My intent with the screenshot was to showcase the general layout of the app. You can subscribe to any RSS feed you want though, like traditional news sources about non-tech things.

Here’s an example of what that could look like (I made a folder with 3 traditional news sources and pinned it to the bottom nav bar):

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[–] olympicyes@lemmy.world 15 points 7 months ago

I just read this headline first and your comment second. Yikes. Guilty.

[–] Obi@sopuli.xyz 10 points 7 months ago (2 children)

Any android alternatives?

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[–] AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world 10 points 7 months ago

I remember when Reddit was consistently two to three days ahead of the news cycle. Same for Fark

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[–] thejml@lemm.ee 17 points 7 months ago (1 children)

I used to use Twitter as a way of directly following a few sources of news. Follow NPR, BBS, Reuters, Etc. I don’t know anyone who expected to learn of news from “the algorithm”. That’s still true today. Expect to get fed news from whatever is trending and you’ll be bamboozled, fed useless stories a day propaganda.

Some of these sources can instead be snagged from RSS feeds and Mastodon and besides official apps, those are much better ways to follow news and always have been.

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[–] autotldr@lemmings.world 14 points 7 months ago

This is the best summary I could come up with:

The same conspiracy-theory-peddling personalities who spammed X with posts claiming that Tuesday’s Baltimore bridge collapse was a deliberate attack have also called mass shootings “false flag” events and denied basic facts about the Covid-19 pandemic.

A Florida Republican running for Congress blamed “DEI” for the bridge collapse as racist comments about immigration and Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott circulated among the far right.

As conspiracy theorists compete for attention in the wake of a tragedy, others seek engagement through dubious expertise, juicy speculation, or stolen video clips.

The boundary between conspiracy theory and engagement bait is permeable; unfounded and provoking posts often outpace the trickle of verified information that follows any sort of major breaking news event.

First, it was happening after a few big shifts in what the internet even is, as Twitter, once a go-to space for following breaking news events, became an Elon Musk-owned factory for verified accounts with bad ideas, while generative AI tools have superpowered grifters wanting to make plausible text and visual fabrications.

Being online during a tragic event is full of consequential nonsense like this, ideas and conspiracy theories that are inane enough to fall into the fog of Poe’s Law and yet harmful to actual people and painful to see in particular when it’s your community being turned into views.

The original article contains 842 words, the summary contains 217 words. Saved 74%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

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