Newstrust

Want to know about and read news stories that other people find interesting, relevant or educational? Check out Newstrust.net, a site that allows users to share stories and rate them.

Newstrust “provides quality news feeds, news literacy tools and a trust network to help citizens make informed decisions about democracy,” according to its Web site.

The idea is for readers to point out good and bad examples of journalism and articles. They will then rate the stories accordingly. I tend to be critical, I mean, do people really even know what they're talking about? Will people just mess with the system? The cynicism is something to keep in mind because trust isn't always foolproof, but as a general rule it tends to work. For every funny guy messing with the system there is usually ten others that want to see the site work. People seem to really like the site, but is it something that would appeal to me?

The first thing that I did when I took my first look around the site was to search for sports related articles. Let’s just say the site didn’t have much to offer. As a whole, I really liked the Web site. Its layout is easy to follow and the main premise is pretty simple. But no sports news?

There is one easy solution. Contribute! If you don’t see something that would interest you on the site, then there are probably others that are missing it too. So it’s simple enough, but here is the problem, I don’t think that I would ever contribute to a site like this and it’s not because I don’t care. I’m just not one to comment at least in public way. I may come to the site and read the articles, but I don’t think I would often rate anything. I’m not a lazy person; on the contrary, I’m a busy person. I’m the type that likes to read something and move on. If I find it extraordinarily moving, perhaps I would pass it on to a friend, but that’s all I would really do.

I’m trying hard for this not to be negative, I just honestly don’t think that at least in this part of my life, that I would ever be too actively involved in a site like this. When I read news online I rarely if ever comment so I don’t think I would ever go to this site for the sole purpose on rating a story. But I’m open to the idea and of the many sites that have this concept; I think Newstrust is going in the most productive direction. This week the creator if Newstrust is coming into our class to give us the in-depth run through and I’m excited to see what he has to say. Can he turn me into a user?