(edit title) This site is a f**king joke! Swedish news? Options

[Grahamsmjöl]

When I first moved to Sweden I had little choice but to visit The Local to find out what was going on and over time as I learnt Swedish I've come to think this has to be a front for something. It can't be a serious attempt at conveying Swedish news in English.

Take, for example, on the front page today, under 'national news' the headline 'Watch the Swedish weather host leave his fly open... on live TV' You're kidding me, right?

Another headline about 'When Alicia Vikander taught us to put our pen in the bottle' or 'The Swedish fashion industry can do better' and so on.

And you wonder why visits to your site are dropping off a cliff. This is the same site who tried to tell us that Brexit would hurt us. Well, if you want to convey a serious message try running serious news articles!

Are you really telling me this is all the news that happened in Sweden recently because after reading through 4 newspapers this morning, they are not!

You are not fit for purpose, you need a major revamp of your business model and, to be blunt, you are a f**king joke and a disgrace to news sites!

I guess you'll delete this post because I know you dislike criticism or any form of dissent, which is why comments are closed on articles both here and on Facebook. You could try answering people on Twitter too.

This site could be so, so good because the original concept was good. But you just got lazy and want to make money from adverts. Sad.

[Placebo]

[Svedallas]

[Gjeebes]

Ooh oh...such negativity, not allowed in Sweden! Beware, I feel a certain Hissy-fit will just "have" to chime in on this one! Don't forget, sugar-plum rivers, chocolate trees, gum-drops smiles, and rainbows shooting out of the eyes...anything else and you get far too close to reality...which is of course, taboo in Sweden!

[andy_fin]

This site could be so, so good because the original concept was good. But you just got lazy and want to make money from adverts.

Couldn't agree more.

You actually have fantastic online presence. I constantly see "read the Swedish news in English" links hosted. We even have it on our office intranet.
There are links to your site on the Swedish government pages and i'm sure i saw it on the British ones.
I'm sure google loves you guys because of the connections from high authority sites, until it scans the mobile version of the site but yeah.
You've got a great position in the market and good digital coverage. But step back and look at it again for yourself. I can't believe anyone is proud of this product or content at the minute.

Blog of a guy playing pokemon in stockholm
Read that and see if it fits in with Sweden's news in English
It's not even fit for facebook

[Hisingen]

Ooh oh...such negativity, not allowed in Sweden! Beware, I feel a certain Hissy-fit will just "have" to chime in on this one! Don't forget, sugar-plum ... (show full quote)

Ooh oh...such negativity, not allowed in Sweden! Beware, I feel a certain Hissy-fit will just "have" to chime in on this one! Don't forget, sugar-plum rivers, chocolate trees, gum-drops smiles, and rainbows shooting out of the eyes...anything else and you get far too close to reality...which is of course, taboo in Sweden! ... (hide full quote)

Your wish is my command Oh Master of the Heebees!

But it would only be fair to point out that this website has nothing to do with Sweden other than it comes out here.

It is supposed to be Swedish news in English, and as you all have so rightly said (albeit in most unpleasant language), the 'news' content is both incredibly biased and mainly from the last century, and they run the same articles ad infinitum. It makes you wonder whether or not they receive a subsidy, because should they do so, it ought to be withdrawn forthwith if not fifthwith.

As to the forums - there is little to say there that has not been already said. They are one long consistent endless gripe, but that is the result of the gripers, not of the website.

Returning to the thread. In my view - you cannot blame Sweden for this.
It is well and truly in the hands of British personnel and yet one can honestly question where their loyalties lie, and to whom. I just had a thought that, perhaps, just perhaps, the personnel are in the category of 'New Brits' whose allegiance is only to the EUSSR..

[yet another brit]

Get real people.

As even someone as trivial as JR Rowling had one of the characters in Harry Potter say - newspapers don't exist to champion freedom and justice. They exist to sell copies of themselves.

So you don't like the Locals editorial policy? Fine, vote with your feet. Don't use the site, and don't post on the forum. Then your traffic figures won't appear in their business cases to advertisers!

Think you can do better - go ahead. Start your own. It's a lot easier these days than buying a printing press...

Objectively I find the site a bit (shall we say) rosy-eyed, and as others have pointed out, it is a shame that the BBC (for example) uses the site as a source even when the going gets tough. But treat it as it is - pretty light-hearted rosy-eyed stuff stuff with a definite commercial profile. So what??? No one is asking you to read/post here, anymore than anyone is requiring you to buy the Daily Mail.

[Gamla Hälsingebock]

Like he said!!!

[andy_fin]

I think the feeling is that it's a wasted opportunity and a lot of wasted potential and that's a shame to see.

[Grahamsmjöl]

I think the feeling is that it's a wasted opportunity and a lot of wasted potential and that's a shame to see.

Exactly my point, it is such wasted potential.

I've been pi*sed off with this site for a long while and the icing on the cake was the propaganda during the Brexit vote where lie after lie was written here.

Forgetting that most news organisations are not impartial it was the obvious lies spread that annoyed me the most aimed at scaring people to vote a way that would enable this shame of a site to still make money in the future.

Such a short sighted view. How much does The Local pay people like Savage? I could find out via Ratsit but can't be arsed, whatever it is they must be able to afford it. If they turned in to a grown up new site their revenue would more than double, paying for extra copywriters.

I know 4 copywriters, including myself, who could do the job of translating and rewriting articles into original pieces. It isn't rocket science. Hell just use Reuters, TT, AFP Nordic and the like, which are generic news feeds. Trawl Twitter for local news, the Polis Twitter feed. The list is endless!

If I had the time I'd do it myself, and I might because I already build news sites that look a lot better than this place. It's just taking that leap and getting known.

[Berkeley]

The media is used in all countries by those in power to control the opinions of the population. Just read the coverage of the same event as reported by Fox News, Russia Today and The Guardian and you'll see how shameless the application of spin can be. And if you regard any single one of those publications as "true" and the others as "lies" you're sure to have swallowed the political bias which controls them hook, line and sinker.

The only rational conclusion is to not believe anything reported in the news and certainly not to pay for a newspaper, yet so many do.

[LLHope]

The media is used in all countries by those in power to control the opinions of the population.

In Sweden the shift came in the 1970's once the Social Democrats got 50%+ majority in Parliament. They embarked upon the social re-engineering program, and that included changing media into an opinion building platform rather than informative, investigative, critical thinking platform.

As for The Local, news is not the primary objective, news items are tweaked to suit their customers (and it is "us" that are the customer). Check: http://www.thelocal.com

[andy_fin]

Knowingly closer to a marketing agency than i imagined.

and it is "us" that are the customer

The customer is the buyer of goods and services.
We're closer to the factory workers relentlessly clicking on links to create the product.

Sweden's news in English
Adverts in English

[Bsmith]

Now, you're scaring me.

[yet another brit]

But until anyone wishes to try and translate Swedish news stories into English themselves, and be pre warned that doing so would be considered as a act against national intere ... (show full quote)

But until anyone wishes to try and translate Swedish news stories into English themselves, and be pre warned that doing so would be considered as a act against national interests with consequences fpr anyone who dare tries to air Swedens dirty laundry. ... (hide full quote)

Really? Plenty of websites on both the left and right that air the dirty laundry.