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This Guy Has Built an Open Source Search Engine as an Alternative to Google in His Spare Time (www.404media.co)

submitted 9 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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"I found it very weird that there essentially is no way to browse the web in an open manner. So that's what I am trying to build," the founder of Stract said.

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[–] [email protected] 18 points 9 months ago (32 children)

For everyone complaining about 404media needing an account for the posts, they explain their reasoning here : https://www.404media.co/why-404-media-needs-your-email-address/

[–] [email protected] 27 points 9 months ago (1 children)

They're fully within their rights to restrict access to their content, just as everyone complaining is fully within their rights to not give up their email to access content.

I realize independent media financing is a huge struggle right now, and the quality of journalism has been in a downwards spiral for decades now. Clearly, the current system is unsustainable, I agree with 404media on that much. I wholeheartedly disagree with restricting access to information as a solution, as that seems completely opposed to what journalism should aim to achieve.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 9 months ago (2 children)

For most of its history, journalism has been locked behind a paywall. I think it's a bit disingeneous to claim that this principle is against the idea of journalism. Journalism and especially good journalism is expensive - under a capitalist system, it's entirely normal to ask for your work to be valued through monetary means.

That said, I'm most annoyed because no one is actually talking about Stract, just about how 404media decided to lock the article.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 9 months ago (1 children)

It worked in the history doesn't mean it should be continued that way. Also neighbors and companies tended to share the same newspaper back then.

Writing was also a much rarer skill in the past.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 9 months ago

Newpapers are available in public libraries

[–] [email protected] 7 points 9 months ago

We don't live in history anymore, we live in the present. Our relationship to information and journalism is not the same as it was in the past, for better and for worse.

In the past, a typical individual would have access to maybe a handful of news sources. You'd pay for the printing and delivery of a physical newspaper and that was going to be the extent of the journalism you were exposed to. I don't think it's realistic to think one should subscribe to every news source they're likely to encounter online. I'd also counter that radio journalism was one of the main sources of information in the 20th century and had no such paywalls.

That said, I'm most annoyed because no one is actually talking about Stract, just about how 404media decided to lock the article

You know how that could have been avoided? If the link actually contained any useful information about Stract instead of being a sign-up page :P

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago

Yeah, that's an automatic no for me on all of their articles. I hope they eventually see posts like this and realize they're shooting themselves in the foot.