Free news make extremists
Free as in “gratis”, of course.
Look at this tweet, or read it below:
This is something that, as far as I can tell, was tweeted by @roguenotary in February 2019. I only saw it this week, and decided to republish it on the real web with some recent evidence added, because it becomes every year more true, and more important:
It’s infuriating how often I google a story to verify it, and the results are:
- New York Times (no free articles left)
- Fox News (always free)
- Washington Post (no free articles left)
- Breitbart (always free)
- Daily Caller (always free)
Guess what people end up reading when this happens?
THIS is what happens (not just in the USA), of course:
(especially when there is no slowness)
I do not have a real, definitive solution for this. Except, shameless plug ahead, direct donations to people like me). But the danger highlighted above is one of the main reason why, in my own little way, I never write on Medium, Patreon and similar places.
Who writes this, why, and how to help
I am Marco Fioretti, tech writer and aspiring polymath doing human-digital research and popularization.
I do it because YOUR civil rights and the quality of YOUR life depend every year more on how software is used AROUND you.
To this end, I have already shared more than a million words on this blog, without any paywall or user tracking, and am sharing the next million through a newsletter, also without any paywall.
The more direct support I get, the more I can continue to inform for free parents, teachers, decision makers, and everybody else who should know more stuff like this. You can support me with paid subscriptions to my newsletter, donations via PayPal (mfioretti@nexaima.net) or LiberaPay, or in any of the other ways listed here.THANKS for your support!