I very much want the news, as a US citizen and for keeping up on what might affect me in the economy, business, e.g., my startup, medicine, technology, family, etc.

Occasionally I get some quite good information and leads to good information from Hacker News. And I have a few other sources.

Then there is what is commonly called the MSM -- mainstream media. It could be on paper, on TV, or on the Internet. Well, I want nothing to do with their paper, junked my TV sets, but do make a lot of use of the Internet.

From news articles, I want the writing at least to come up to common high school standards for writing term papers, especially careful references hopefully to credible, respected, objective primary sources for all claims.

But I want more: I want data, data presentations, and data analysis. For data presentations I want, say, graphs done like can find in articles on applied statistics, physics, applied math, and engineering -- again, with good references, and, maybe surprising, axes can actually read with annotation, large type, thick lines, thick tick marks, usually solid black on a white background. Then for data analysis, I realize that that is asking a bit much of the MSM.

That's what I want. I do hope, and have some hope, that the Internet is letting new sources with content for selected audiences provide more of what I want.

But for the MSM today, I absolutely, positively, flatly refuse to take anything from them at all seriously. Ah, maybe there is an exception: I should also be well informed on hoaxes, scams, fads, total nonsense, ugly perversions, despicable outrages, destructive, manipulative propaganda, etc., and I trust the MSM to give me a lot of that. But I don't get much of that from the MSM because I refuse to pay any serious attention to the MSM. To me, the MSM has no credibility, none, is fundamentally corrupting and dishonest.

My standard remark for the MSM is that on paper they can't compete with Charmin and on the Internet they are useless for wrapping dead fish heads. But the MSM is worse than that; the MSM is corrupting, harmful.

In particular, when posts here at Hacker News are to articles in the MSM, nearly always I will immediately, strongly, solidly, bitterly refuse to look. I'm not going there. It's bad stuff, and I just won't go there.

Yes, I'm angry with the MSM. This is not a small thing with me, and not temporary or a snap reaction. Instead I've been angry with the MSM and slowly developing better understanding of what they do and why for years. I have learned that a lot of what the MSM does goes way back and, actually, was neatly explained in the 1930s movie Meet John Doe and other movies.

What the MSM does is not a secret,
and it is not just waste but deeply corrupting. I strongly believe in the First Amendment, but US citizens need to be critical readers, informed consumers, to understand how bad the MSM really is.

The only future I see for the MSM is that they just go out of business. They can be replaced by new sources on the Internet where they pay nothing for ink or paper. For the images, still or video, those are now getting much cheaper and easier to do. Writing some HTML is much easier than setting type or setting up a fancy studio set with hollow headed, blow-dried anchors.

Fixing the MSM is pointless, would be a waste of money: Their credibility is GONE, and it would be very expensive to bring it back and much better use of the money just to start new sources. MSM, all of you, bye, bye.