County Highway is a new American newspaper with a retro-19th century look that is only available in paper copy and is determined to never go online. Like papers of times gone by, it’s a broadsheet with six tightly packed small-print columns across a page. Just the thought of it makes my eyes ache.
The editors describe their ethos:
‘Some of us fear the spectre of an incipient totalitarianism emerging from our laptops and iPhones. Some of us are simply allergic to conformity and brand-names. What we share in common is a revulsion at the smugness, sterility, and shitty aesthetics of the culture being forced upon us by monopoly tech platforms and corporate media, and a desire to make something better. We encourage you to think of our publication as a kind of hand-made alternative to the undifferentiated blob of electronic “content” that you scroll through every morning, most of which is produced by robots.’
This quote comes from their website, the same website where I found links to their Instagram and X/Twitter accounts.
Contradictions aside, I appreciate the spirit of this. It’s true that a lot of online content follows trends, is highly commercialised and is controlled by a handful of tech giants. But this is not a new phenomenon brought on by the internet or digital technology. Not too long ago, television was run by a few large companies and the government. These channels were and many still are beholden to advertisers or to the government of the day. Words like ‘smugness, sterility, and shitty aesthetics’ could easily apply to the box. Online news and social media are just another version of this with the added advantages of interactivity and citizens’ journalism – though some would say these are the worst features on online news. Discuss.
Most of my news comes from reading my phone or laptop. I tend to go directly to news outlets, and I particularly like the moving images from embedded video clips. I also listen to news on radio, podcasts and television. While I don’t have any hankering for thin inky pages, in the UK my Sunday mornings wouldn’t be right without the paper version of The Observer. In France, it’s the Saturday edition of Le Monde. These traditions today involve having the phone on at the same time – checking sources, looking up the odd word and adding reviewed books to my Amazon Wishlist. I accept that we live in a time where paper and screen co-exist.
Furthermore, County Highway, do you really think most digital news content is produced by robots? AI might be able to produce passable news copy, but only from texts written by humans through the conduits of human experience.
My final criticism – why harken back to the style of news from two centuries ago? Aside from being difficult on the eyes, it was colourless and rarely had photos. I suspect nostalgia is at work here. To quote Milan Kundera ‘The Greek word for “return” is nostos. Algos means “suffering.” So, nostalgia is the suffering caused by an unappeased yearning to return.’
Paola Trimarco 