New Win10 News app vs. Google News page – which do you prefer?

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I don’t claim to be an expert at web page layouts, or news content curation, so I’ll just post these screenshots and let you decide. First is the new
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I prefer Microsoft News.

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JohnW, MrJimPhelps

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MSN news, or Bing.

Windows 10 Pro 22H2

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I don’t use news apps/sites like these at all. At least the Google news page is something I consciously have to seek out, whereas the Microsoft app is just – to me – another annoying and unnecessary element to be uninstalled as quickly as possible.

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Noel Carboni, Bill C., Ascaris, HiFlyer, GreatAndPowerfulTech

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I don’t use Win10 as my daily driver. But it looks like the App is made for a phone (which Microsoft doesn’t have to speak of) or a tablet. Certainly not for a computer or a laptop. And the UWP Apps aren’t really programs, they are just unnecessary bloatware on what SHOULD be an Operating System.

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Noel Carboni, Bill C., Ascaris, HiFlyer, Charlie, bobcat5536, MikeFromMarkham, CADesertRat, JohnW, GreatAndPowerfulTech, FakeNinja, David F

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Except for ‘My News’ (not sure what Microsoft would consider that), all the categories on the News app for Windows 10 are the same as on the MSN News app for Windows 8.1. Can’t tell if customization is allowed or not in the app on Win10 like it is on Win8.1. Only customization on the Google News page is to toggle between showing tabs on the left & removing them (Menu or ‘hamburger’ icon). The tabs I like on the page are For You & Local. Business is Google’s version of MSN Money, which is a separate Windows app as well as a MSN News section. Sports is the same way, a separate Windows app (MSN Sports) as well as a MSN News section. Science & Health are bundled with Technology on MSN News.

Edit: Except for U.S., World, & Local, each tab has sub-sections. Business has Latest, Economy, Markets, Jobs, Personal finance, & Entrepreneurship.

Bought a refurbished Windows 10 64-bit, currently updated to 22H2. Have broke the AC adapter cord going to the 8.1 machine, but before that, coaxed it into charging. Need to buy new adapter if wish to continue using it.
Wild Bill Rides Again...

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Don’t read the news, and be uninformed.

Read the news, and be misinformed.

The format these contents get presented in, have more to do with entertainment and distraction than serious information. What would need thorough details explained, nevertheless gets simplified beyond reason and cut into tiny pieces that are easy to be consumed and easy to be swallowed between the one and the next moment. And often, it is news edited and hand-selected by lobby groups which have brought the wording into line, and nudge critical thinking away from unwanted foci, and lure people into focussing on what is considered to be wanted and “correct”.

So why care about the design of these apps? The apps may or may not be a problem. The real and profound problems root much deeper.  🙂

Marc

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Lori, cesmart4125, Noel Carboni, Sessh, Bill C., HiFlyer, Charlie, JCCWsusser

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I have to seriously ask… could they possibly fit any less useful information on a screen?

I mean, maybe if they increased the ratio of click-bait articles to actual news, they could achieve a 0% usefulness rating.  As it is now, they’re hitting 50% for actual news links.  Maybe 52% if you count the cut-off headline at the bottom that they couldn’t figure out how to format.

The ratio of useful information to wasted space is possibly the lowest I’ve ever seen on a “news” page.

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HiFlyer

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Since W7 is my daily computer and I seldom use my W10 laptop, I use the Google news more than the MS news, but I’m not thrilled with the changes that Google made to their news feed.

Just an observation, MS news seems more slanted toward Liberals and Google news seems to cover more diversified news. Don’t send hate mail, just my take on them.

Don't take yourself so seriously, no one else does 🙂
All W10 Pro at 22H2,(2 Desktops, 1 Laptop).

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HiFlyer

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Since I use  W7  You can set it to search.yahoo.com which has the Flickr background pictures. No yahoo news.

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The new Win10 News app looks just like MSN/BING News, which I can’t stand its photo format and find it very annoying. Google News page is much better and not annoying.

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Lately I try not to use anything Microsoft unless I absolutely  have  to.

I have used Google on occasion and it does fit my needs.

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Is there any real news reporting anymore? I certainly don’t consider these news sources from Microsoft or Google really very good. I prefer going to a wide sampling of sources for news to try and sift through bias and bad fact checking. Not many good journalists out there anymore.

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Noel Carboni, Sessh, Elly, HiFlyer, Charlie

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I only look at independent news outlets because I don’t like my news to be propaganda. 🙂  The propaganda ban was lifted in the US five years ago which prevented the media from using propaganda on it’s own people. Now, that’s all there is in the mainstream. The only ones reporting actual news and talking about important things are independent media sources. People seem to really love propaganda, though.

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Noel Carboni, Elly

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I don’t read news while I’m on my computer.  I get a newspaper (yes, an actual local printed newspaper) and subscribe to two news magazines.  I don’t much even watch the news on TV because I get tired of the same old things night after night.

Now if I were to look for some news item I’d probably go to Patch and then maybe Google.

Being 20 something in the 70's was far more fun than being 70 something in the insane 20's

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I’ll take google news for $100 Alex. I prefer information over pictures. I don’t know if anyone remembers a few years ago Sport Illustrated did a major makeover to their web site to be more “app friendly”. The whole main page page was nothing but pictures with captions. I was on another forum at the time and I called attention to the change on that forum and everyone pretty much agreed it was a mess. SI slowly cut back on images and finally went back to a more traditional look.

Red Ruffnsore

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Elly, Bill C.

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Win10 looks good but offers little to no information.  Google News works and changes a bit depending on device.  As mentioned in other comments, the mainstream news is largely useless now anyways, so I guess that makes Win10 more in line with the times.

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HiFlyer

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No Windows News. No Google News.

I’m partial to https://www.npr.org/

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Google is the less of two evils; ratio of clickbait and irrelevant garbage is less. Google tends to source from fairly trustworthy sources, tho “Man Bites Dog” garbage appears higher in rank ofttimes than important, relevant news.

Anyone remember RSS? <sigh>

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HiFlyer

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RSS + Feedly – because I’m the one who chooses what to read, not some AI with an agenda.

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Karlston, Elly, HiFlyer

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I’d prefer the text Google News over the image/tile infested W10 mess. Much easier to scan Google News looking for interesting articles.

That said, as an anonymous posted, if there’s any algorithm/AI “choosing” what I like, then forget it. No one knows what I like as well as me. No dumb Algorithm or AI ever comes even close.

For me, Feedly & RSS shows all news in a simple, easy to scan list and lets me choose what I like.

Hanlon's Razor: Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.

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Elly

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I have zero interest in tablet UI on desktop. So Google wins, though I do wish they’d also use the space better.

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@Karlston: I agree that I’m suspicious of any algorithm, but there’s no way I would want every single news article from any source, since there just isn’t a news organization that only covers news that I find useful. So I do kinda need a computer to sort through and find what I need.

I just need said algorithm to be trustworthy, transparent, and tweakable. The first just basically means it’s consistently good at its job. The second means I can see what it’s doing (with scores, list of things it isn’t showing me, statistics it is using, etc. ), and the third means that, if I’m dissatisfied, I can mess with settings and filters and such to get better results.

I think a large part of the reason for not trusting algorithms is the lack of ability to know about or change what they do, and possibly a bit of paranoia that someone might put their thumb on the scales, or we might create a bubble. If we can deal with that, I think algorithmic news is better.

But it absolutely can’t be profit driven, and needs a way to discourage anyone from trying to use it as a profit driven thing. I definitely would want some natural language processing use to try and filter out clickbait, and criteria for reputable sources.

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I don’t run Win 10. If I had to pick, I’d choose google news, simply because I prefer to see headlines and weather info rather than lots of pictures.

Truthfully I avoid google news, MSN’s starting page, Juno’s  starting page and Yahoo’s starting page. I figured out how to create a Juno and Yahoo bookmark to get to email sign in without maneuvering through the “news”.

I created my own start page from Protopage. I get to pick the elements I want to see. I have headlines from lots of sources, local weather and of course my daily dose of Dilbert.

I used to use MyWay as my start page for the same reason. I got to pick what I wanted to see and how many headlines I wanted to see. Then they died and I searched around and tried several “home pages” until I settled on Protopage as closest to what I was used to.

 

Got coffee?

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Mr. Natural wrote:

I’ll take google news for $100 Alex. I prefer information over pictures. I don’t know if anyone remembers a few years ago Sport Illustrated did a major makeover to their web site to be more “app friendly”. The whole main page page was nothing but pictures with captions. I was on another forum at the time and I called attention to the change on that forum and everyone pretty much agreed it was a mess. SI slowly cut back on images and finally went back to a more traditional look.

I fully agree, although my home page is DuckDuckGo.  I do not like home pages with news, as they are time wasters and too often distracting or aggrevating.  I find that pages with photos with a caption are mainly clickbait to take to to a cursory story with lots of ads on the sidelines (on my PC that is lots of white space), and links to more clickbait content of questionable value.

I prefer headlines and a single sentence of the lead paragraph.  That is usually enough to tell if the reporter knows their craft.  I find one of the best sites I visit with news is e-Reg.  Yes it can be opinionated and snarky, but there is rarely true fluff, NO celebrity garbage, and I usually leave satisfied with the reporting, or interested enough to do further research.  Note satisfied does NOT equal agreement, but is more a feeling that I did not waste my time.

The News app on my iPad and iPhone is customizable to an extent and is acceptable, for what it is.  I eliminate the fluff, and keep some of the traditional news from the rights and the left, and NPR and BBC.

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HiFlyer

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Well they both “Snoop” on you anyway so what’s the difference? M$’s little offering gives you notifications in the Notifications centre and its generally about nothing your really following avidly, you don’t have to surrender your Machine to the “Evils” of an M$ Acc. for Money, News, Mail, Sport, Weather etc as they all run perfectly fine on a Local Acc. but of course we know there’s a, as The Register puts it, “Data slurp” going on in the Background as to preferences etc.
Google seems to be “Hell bent” on getting you to sign up for an Acc. for any type of customisation, which I have an aversion to as there seems to be enough “Data Slurping” going on as it is, why add to it? We all know about the recent Targeting and Psychological profiling according to News Preferences and various other nefarious underhand stereotyping, so why should I contribute to the Mayhem? I just want the news. Strangely as an aside whilst Google blatantly Moneterises the Data gathered and touts its self as just that as its Business Model, M$ seems not be, and actually looks like its not “Hawking” the Data gathered all over the net but I could be wrong with that assertion. Besides when travelling abroad just change the local Location Setting and every thing falls in to line where you are, and in any case your no more than a few clicks away from the News How you like it, when you like it, as you like it. Such is todays connected World.

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Bill C.

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woody wrote:

I’ll just post these screenshots and let you decide. First is the new Windows News app,

I think that’s the old Microsoft News app, not the one just released to the Fast Ring only.

What’s the version number of the app in that screenshot? 4.24.11382.0 or 4.25.11762.0?

(Interesting that everyone here has decided without trying it.)

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The question Woody posed was whether people liked the layout of what was shown in picture A vs. what was shown in picture B.  What part of that implies that people should go try the two and give them a thorough workout?

In my case, all the information I need is right there in the original post: It’s an “app,” and it only runs on Windows 10.  “Apps” are not permitted on any computer of mine, and neither is Windows 10, so there you go.  Of course, that’s not what Woody asked… his question was about the layout shown.  I don’t find either of them to be all that good in those terms.  If the MS offering was a web site instead of an app, I’d skip both of them, preferably in favor of something that made appropriate use of my 23 inch display, and that did so sans hamburger icon.

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HiFlyer, Elly

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If we’re only choosing between screenshots, it’s a shame Woody didn’t post the right one.

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Maybe you could post a screenshot of what it is that you prefer?

Non-techy Win 10 Pro and Linux Mint experimenter

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Google news is better than MS news with Javascript disabled.

I basically always News surf with JS disabled.

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This is going to sound a little like these lines from Airplane!:

Rumack: What was it we had for dinner tonight?

Elaine Dickinson: Well, we had a choice of steak or fish.

Rumack: Yes, yes, I remember, I had lasagna.

I mainly get news at this point from the BBC app.  Occasionally I’ll peruse NPR.  But IMHO, these sorts of aggregator services have way too much sway on what articles people read.

If I had to choose between the two offered here and nothing else, I’d pick Google News.  I’d much rather look for interesting articles myself than “wade through the tiles.”  I have too many bad memories of cleaning out flooded basements for that.

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HiFlyer

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I prefer none of these kinds of displays, but choose Google, if I had to choose.

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HiFlyer

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New Win10 News app vs. Google News page – which do you prefer?

Prefer the clean layout from google, but really don’t have any time for either….

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HiFlyer

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woody wrote:

First is the new Windows News app, which only runs on Windows 10.

… and iOS and Android:

The all-new Microsoft News app is now on iOS and Android

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/newsapp

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b wrote:

I think that’s the old Microsoft News app, not the one just released to the Fast Ring only.

Maybe there are some W10 users that will look forward to that particular change when it makes its way into the current version.

I have to say, though, that it isn’t pictures I’m interested in, it is the quality of the reporting… and that applies to Microsoft and Google, both… and I’ll add in a bunch of traditional news sources, too. Too often I find the facts of the story glossed over and bent in a certain direction. I’m not looking for a direction… just the facts… and most times, although pictures could be used to tell a story, they can also be used to give a false impression of what the actual story is. Not that people can’t do that with words… but these news apps haven’t impressed me. I know I use Windows 7… but we have one lone family member whose computer has managed to stay on W10…  Although the formatting of the app is different, the quality of the actual information is probably the same.

Thank you @b. I appreciate that you even managed to get the same news stories’ pictures… because that is a better comparison to base a decision on.

Non-techy Win 10 Pro and Linux Mint experimenter

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Lori, Noel Carboni

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My first question:

Why do things that can be done (and adeptly at that) with a web page need an “App”?

The world is forgetting that computing can be much more than just casual browsing.

-Noel

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I read a study a few years ago that the average person only used a few apps on their phone, mostly 4-6 or something, most of the time. So I guess the browser is still used, unless those apps take all their time! This reflects my personal use and the browser is still the most important app.

As for news, I am attracted to images, it is normal, but that doesn’t mean I would use them to get news. I see those pretty news apps like the MS one as a unneeded distraction and I disable this so I only look at news when I want and using the sources I prefer. I think there is also a real danger to promote bias with curated content.

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None of the major tech companies has a News or Home Page which is free of some sort of bias and algorithmic messing around.

But for the page layout aspect alone, I like Yahoo News. It’s a straightforward list of stories, although most are social media or ads. But having pictures to the left and headlines in the center works well for me. A quick scroll down the page and I know if there’s anything worth reading further.  (I block the pure ads on the right.)

I also like the integration of Yahoo with TechCrunch, Endgadget, PC World, Computerworld and several business pubs, most of which are under the Verizon-Oath blanket these days. And don’t forget the AP and ABC news tie-ins. (Though my TV source for news is NBC Nightly News.)

My other main source for general-interest science and tech stories and shows is PBS, especially WGBH Boston. And of course, NPR. And WBUR Boston. (Full disclosure, I contribute dues to WBUR and NPR.)

-- rc primak

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