moragmacpherson (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
moragmacpherson) wrote2011-11-10 09:31 pm
moragmacpherson) wrote2011-11-10 09:31 pm
Entry tags:
What the hell is TheStir? Or: State College isn't the only thing that stinks on my news page
Hi! This post is not about Penn State, but a complaint that stems from surfing google news and following various "suggested" links on the news articles as we've been trying to keep up with the cult of apologists and the latest worst thing yet all day. (Discussion, linkshare, and rending of hair continues in the comments - Switch's idea of donating to RAINN made me feel clean again.)
But anyway: TheStir. I hadn't noticed you existed until a couple of days ago. Today you are the source of more than a dozen of the spotlighted links on my Google News page and you are the top "suggested" link at the end of nearly every article from a major news source that I've read today.
Have I mentioned that I've been reading about pedophiles and the evil fuckwads who enable them and apologize for them all day?
But somehow, after I've read Dan Shaugnessy or Dan Bernstein or Dan Savage (there's been a lot of excellent writing by Dans in the last twenty-four hours) working up an excellently researched and crafted righteous rage, there's a link to the CUTEST STORY ABOUT THINGS YOU SHOULDN'T SAY TO A DIVORCEE AND THE LATEST NEWS ABOUT THE KARDASHIANS. I clicked on the divorcee link after the fifth time it popped up because I figured that I might need a break from all of the child rape. Guess what? Your humorists and gossip columnists? Really, really not interesting. Not funny. Irritating.
The "top comments" sidebar you've got running gives me hope, because unlike the too-vapid-for-Cosmo promoted links on my hard news stories, or your main page which is currently headed by a post about "Corduroy Day" (?)(WTF?), the top commented links are all on articles that actually have substance, like endemic racism, sexism, and oh yeah, systemic institutional support of child rape. Why weren't these the suggested links on the hard news stories that I was reading? Anyway, I checked out a couple of your columnists and: sorry. I support you ladies writing about subjects of substance. Spread the good word, but we just have different senses of humor and ideas about what constitutes good writing/reporting.
But now I'm curious: where the hell did you come from? Because you guys have appeared out of nowhere and must be paying Google, CBS, ABC, The Boston Globe, and HuffPo a metric fuckton of money for this kind of preferential listing. Hmmm... you've got an all-female editorial staff, that's cool, and you're a subsidiary of cafemom? Right. Cafemom. Huh, you have a tab on your main page that reads "Power Up for Positivity".
**starts backing away**
But maybe I'm being a little hasty. Maybe you're a nice, earnest network of women (which just doesn't work with my nasty sarcasm) who built a grassroots social networking community out of your shared interests as young mothers—"CafeMom was founded by Andrew Shue and Michael Sanchez. Lead investors are Highland Capital Partners and Draper Fisher Jurvetson."
Yeah, that explains the stink of "what male marketers think women really care about" your site has all over it. Get the hell out of my news, you vapid faux-alternative corporate fuckwits.
But anyway: TheStir. I hadn't noticed you existed until a couple of days ago. Today you are the source of more than a dozen of the spotlighted links on my Google News page and you are the top "suggested" link at the end of nearly every article from a major news source that I've read today.
Have I mentioned that I've been reading about pedophiles and the evil fuckwads who enable them and apologize for them all day?
But somehow, after I've read Dan Shaugnessy or Dan Bernstein or Dan Savage (there's been a lot of excellent writing by Dans in the last twenty-four hours) working up an excellently researched and crafted righteous rage, there's a link to the CUTEST STORY ABOUT THINGS YOU SHOULDN'T SAY TO A DIVORCEE AND THE LATEST NEWS ABOUT THE KARDASHIANS. I clicked on the divorcee link after the fifth time it popped up because I figured that I might need a break from all of the child rape. Guess what? Your humorists and gossip columnists? Really, really not interesting. Not funny. Irritating.
The "top comments" sidebar you've got running gives me hope, because unlike the too-vapid-for-Cosmo promoted links on my hard news stories, or your main page which is currently headed by a post about "Corduroy Day" (?)(WTF?), the top commented links are all on articles that actually have substance, like endemic racism, sexism, and oh yeah, systemic institutional support of child rape. Why weren't these the suggested links on the hard news stories that I was reading? Anyway, I checked out a couple of your columnists and: sorry. I support you ladies writing about subjects of substance. Spread the good word, but we just have different senses of humor and ideas about what constitutes good writing/reporting.
But now I'm curious: where the hell did you come from? Because you guys have appeared out of nowhere and must be paying Google, CBS, ABC, The Boston Globe, and HuffPo a metric fuckton of money for this kind of preferential listing. Hmmm... you've got an all-female editorial staff, that's cool, and you're a subsidiary of cafemom? Right. Cafemom. Huh, you have a tab on your main page that reads "Power Up for Positivity".
**starts backing away**
But maybe I'm being a little hasty. Maybe you're a nice, earnest network of women (which just doesn't work with my nasty sarcasm) who built a grassroots social networking community out of your shared interests as young mothers—"CafeMom was founded by Andrew Shue and Michael Sanchez. Lead investors are Highland Capital Partners and Draper Fisher Jurvetson."
Yeah, that explains the stink of "what male marketers think women really care about" your site has all over it. Get the hell out of my news, you vapid faux-alternative corporate fuckwits.