Among other news sources I sometimes look at Google News on the iPad. It insists on showing me lots of MTLBlog junk even though it isn’t one of the sources I selected and it’s far from being a reputable news source.
In addition some of the other “sources” offered are more like PR outlets and you can’t add additional sources you prefer.
Am I being thick here and missing something central in how the app works, or is this thing broken on purpose and I should simply go back to twitter as a general aggregator?
Kevin 22:41 on 2019-02-09 Permalink
That is how Google defines news. I’ll note that a couple weeks ago google finally decided to have Youtube stop pushing flat earth videos
Sean 00:23 on 2019-02-10 Permalink
Check out Nuzzel: https://itunes.apple.com/ca/app/nuzzel-news-for-professionals/id692285770?mt=8
Otherwise, I still find subscribing to RSS feeds to be best way to keep up with my favourite sites/blogs.
JPM 01:36 on 2019-02-10 Permalink
I do not have this problem. I can add sources in the favourites tab and my Montreal feed has no mtlblog to be seen nor does it ever show up on the general section. If it did I could easily just block the source. I am using the google news app on android.
dhomas 06:21 on 2019-02-10 Permalink
I’m also on Android and have never used the iPad app, so I don’t know if it works the same way. On Android, when I see a news source that I don’t trust, I click the context menu button (3 dots) on the top right of the story “card” and I click “Not interested in stories from X”. I think MTLBlog was the first one I blocked.
Kate 08:57 on 2019-02-10 Permalink
Seems I can silence MTLBlog, although knowing how social media work I suspect this is temporary. On iPad I don’t seem to be able to add new sources. Sean, I will explore Nuzzel, thank you.
EmilyG 11:28 on 2019-02-10 Permalink
I just googled something (on my laptop) and got a bunch of MTLBlog garbage. Sigh…
Chris 12:29 on 2019-02-10 Permalink
I’m afraid you’re being thick Kate. 🙂 Google is an advertising company. They don’t care about “News”. It’s just another way to get eyeballs on their ads. The actual truthfulness or quality of their ‘news’ is irrelevant. They outsource the work of deciding what’s crap to JPM and others.
Bill Binns 13:00 on 2019-02-10 Permalink
I see a lot of their stuff in Google News as well but haven’t really tried to do anything about it yet. I hate myself for clicking on their “OMG Montreal is Going to Get Eleventy Thousand Feet of Snow on Tuesday!!” nonsense.
Kate 13:49 on 2019-02-10 Permalink
Chris, some feeds count as news and some don’t. MTLBlog should obviously not count as news, even on Google’s watch.
Chris 15:32 on 2019-02-10 Permalink
Why shouldn’t it? It serves the function of selling ads.
Kevin 16:00 on 2019-02-10 Permalink
Because it isn’t news Chris. It is a bunch of lies and falsehoods and paid advertisements disguised as articles.
Blork 16:37 on 2019-02-10 Permalink
Regardless of the lies and falsehoods, MTLBlog isn’t breaking any laws, and according to whatever set of checkboxes are used to identify what kind of site it is from Google’s perspective, it likely meets one or more of the categories for “news” because it talks about events and goings-on in Montreal. Therefore it is “news.” Because it fits the checkboxes and there is no checkbox for “lies and falsehoods.”
I’m not defending MTLblog or Google. I’m just pointing out that the fact it is considered “news” by Google is because of how it fits into a set of categories that do not include value judgements. It is entirely about categorization so as to facilitate the programmatic advertising algorithms.
Chris 20:40 on 2019-02-10 Permalink
Kevin, it may not meet my and your definition of news, but it meets Google’s own, which is good enough for Google. Lies, falsehoods, disguised paid ads: basically Google’s business model!