The Weird Near Future of News
NowThisNews was started a couple years ago as a “brand new video network built from scratch for people who get their news on mobile devices and through social streams.” It was given five million dollars. Its early videos were short YouTube-style news bulletins; most of the old embeds seem to be gone. Now, a few PIVOTS later, the company is focusing on publishing news directly to apps, including Vine and Instagram. This concept — bypassing websites, going directly to other companies’ channels — is something that a lot of people will start trying over the next year, because the internet is broken.
NowThisNews is also publishing directly to Snapchat, the ephemeral texting and video app. Here is what Snapnews looks like in its primitive form: A ninety-second reel, divided into small units, each composed by finger or stylus. Who knew! This is NowThisNews’s Monday stream in its entirety:
On one hand this is literally finger-painting. On the other, it’s not not news.