• Get Ready To Barf. AOL And Sears Want To Push "Good News" Down Your Throat

    Wednesday, June 10th, 2009

    Erick Schonfeld is a technology journalist and the former Editor in Chief of TechCrunch. At TechCrunch, he oversaw the editorial content of the site, helped to program the Disrupt conferences and CrunchUps, produced TCTV shows, and wrote daily for the blog. He joined TechCrunch as Co-Editor in 2007, and helped take it from a popular blog to a thriving... → Learn More

    Are you tired of all the depressing headlines every day about bombings, layoffs, and financial collapse? Sears sure is. Its “Life. Well Spent.” ad campaign just doesn’t work next to downbeat stories. What if there was a news site that only ran good news? Well, that wouldn’t really be a news site, but Sears decided to create one anyway in partnership with AOL News. It is called Good News Now, or GNN.

    There you will find feel-good stories such as “Senior Couple Ties the Knot,” “Lucky Boy Discovers Seven-Leaf Clover,” and “Tourist Survives Dangerous Train Ride.” Topics you can explore further include “Heroes, Winners,” “Upbeat News,” and “More Good News.” You can barf now.

    Of course, the whole site is plastered with ads from Sears. GNN is like a cross between a bad advertorial and a splog. It is what happens when you let advertisers select the news. If you need a reason to save journalism, this is it.

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