Best British Newspaper

The Guardian is the least worst.

I buy the Guardian on Saturdays for the Guide, and that's it. Don't really understand why anyone would need to buy a newspaper these days.

Old folks, commuters and people with a fetish for inky fingers.

Trying to separate this even slightly from political stance, I'd say:

Graun > Telegraph > Indy > Mirror > Sun > Times > >>>>>>>>>>>>> Mail >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Express.

^^^pretty much this, except maybe shove the Indy up one. Sports coverage is WEAK, though.

Honest unsnarky question from a non-newspaper reader. What do you like about the Telegraph?

I voted Telegraph, for the crossword. I might switch to Times when I get better at them.

Years ago me and a friend used to do all the broadsheet crosswords most days and the Telegraph was way too easy, to the point of being no fun.

I'm judging that on, if I saw the pile of them sitting in a cafe, which one I'd find the most worth reading in, even if I didn't agree with it. The Mail and Express score badly for both being full of useless toss AND very right-wing.

But they're all rubbish really.

Needs METRO as an option

From an objective "this is what a newspaper should do" viewpoint, the Mail is the most succesful in the country. But, y'know, gtfo.

Is Rushbridger still the best paid editor in the country? How did he swing that?

I think the Sun is a lot better than the Mirror in their field. Mirror = too much po-faced sub-Dickensian cobblers.

NB This is based on one reading a year, tops.

The Sun has the best subs in the country, certainly.

Telegraph plus points - sport is pretty good but getting duller, cultural stuff can be good if it avoids popular culture, foreign affairs news well at least they actually bother with it, politics well at least its always useful to keep up with how yer educated right-winger is thinking. Fuck a crossword.

The Indy's policy of putting screaming editorial on their front page has always annoyed me. I liked them when they were dull as ditchwater with nice photojournalism. Also its sport is atrocious.

I don't understand why anyone buys the Times, unless they're too embarassed to by the Torygraph.

Ugh that last sentence, I R Graun subber clearly.

I've always assumed the Telegraph is the Express to the Times' Mail.

But I only ever buy a paper to do the crossword so that's prolly why I'm down on the Telegraph.

The Sun has the best subs in the country, certainly.

But, you know, so what?

I hate The Times out of all proportion. Probably something to do with a combination of Jeremy Clarkson and Libby Purves.

(Needs Metro and FT option really. Both would probably place higher in my list than the Telegrapn).

why must the guardian have the best website :(

telegraph is generally better at popular culture than the guardian and indie tbh!

I've always assumed the Telegraph is the Express to the Times' Mail.

-- Noodle Vague, Tuesday, 13 November 2007 09:31 (15 minutes ago) Link

if anything it's the other way round, but they are very different beasts.

capn save-a-tory over here. i guess i vote guardian in the end.

Oh I'm not voting.

I would prolly take on board arguments for people buying the Times or Telegraph or Mail but the quote-unquote success of the Express just baffles me. It's bland and sloppy and I don't see what anyone gets out of it that they couldn't get more of from the Mail

I buy the Guardian on Saturdays for the Guide, and that's it.

Ditto

I don't think the Express really has much 'success' - it's a vanity project for Richard Desmond to rant* at whoever's listening, even more so than any other newspapers.

*Ok not directly but if you work for Desmond, you do what he says full stop. I've encountered so many people who refuse point blank to work for him, who'd be happy working for pretty much anyone else, including Murdoch or Rothermere.

"Maddy Says Abolish Inheritance Tax"

my racist grandmother buys the express when they've run out of the mail -- my guess is that's their main audience.

This is where the party ends
I can't stand here listening to you
And your racist grandmother
I know politics bore you
But I feel like a hypocrite talking to you
And your racist grandmother

diff between times and torygraph is:

torygraph wants a nice stable hierarchical class society in which everyone knows and is comfortable in their place.

times wants an "aspirational" hierarchical society in which the winners, actively despise the losers. the times is more vicious than the torygraph, and generally much more stupid on foreign policy.

Okay, so Torygraph = Macmillan and Times = Cameron. Sweet.

Times = vile

... and boring with it

THAT'S WHAT I SAID

Killfile ruins internet debate again.

The intl news section of the Times is often worth reading i.e. when the monks marched in Burma the Times had lots of info nobody else had.

I like to think this is because the Times has had the same correspondent in Rangoon for the past 50 years, sitting in some dusty hotel bar called "The Raffles" and only writing a story when the phone rings or he hears the sound of shooting outside.

White suit, panama hat.

nubile 17 year old housegirl

^^apparently robert fisk rolls that way a little

i think the pre-murdoch times ran that kind of operation, but not so much now. it's the sort of thing you read and forget about in private eye: "veteran stringer dumped by upstart editor via facebook" kind of thing

i will vote for the independent, because i think of them all their heart is in the rightest place.

I'm pretty sure the Mail's heart is in the Rightest place.

*horripilates*

"We're not the Independent. We can't just write 'Cruelty' in big letters under a picture of a dolphin. That's cheating!"

i don't get what the independent is about now.

it hates poor people.

xpost

haha otm

I haven't read the Independent in ages, mind. During term-time I don't really read the papers; I rely on BBC News. At home it's Guardian/Independent/Times, mostly on Saturday. I do agree with the Times haters; it's loathsome, suggestive crap.

The Daily Mail has Page 3 of course...
http://img.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2007/11_02/BraMalFunctEMP_228x425.jpg

My order would run something like:

Financial Times > Independent > Guardian/Times/Telegraph > Mirror > Sun > Mail > Express

Why is the Daily "ooh aah" Star not on this list?

I'm an American but my great uncle was the editor for the Daily Mirror for a while, so that's basically the only one I've heard of aside from the Guardian. What's so wrong about the Daily Mail?

How long have you got?

It's read mainly by women, women are dumb.

Why I hate the Daily Mail distilled into one edition

Why is the Daily "ooh aah" Star not on this list?

Because it's not a newspaper?

Shame the FT is not up there because I would consider voting for it. I never buy it but when you fly BA you get a choice of Mail, Times or FT as your free paper and it's often the international paper in Hotels so I end up reading it quite a lot. Like the economist it is easy to decode and it covers a good deal of stuff that the other papers don't touch not just business and some of it's culture writing is quite good.

the independent seems to carry pretty much all the exact same stories as the other broadsheets - do they actually have any staff?

not many. it's a loss-maker.

All British newspapers are run at a loss, aren't they?

Surely not the Sun?

I think The Sun more than any others, considering how it's basically just an advert for other Murdoch enterprises (especially Sky).

or the mail.

but anyway the indy is pretty short-staffed.

Is the Daily Sport still going?

yes.

to be honest I absolutely love the sub-Dickensian tone of the Mirror

"Blair earned £250,000 for one week of public speaking in the United States, and £240,000 for just one speech in China.

What is truly shocking is that these six-figure Lottery sums are nothing special.

This is business as usual for our former Prime Minister and he clearly intends to milk it big time.

What a contrast to the fate of Lance Corporal Craig "Freddie" Lundberg, 22, who was blinded in Iraq earlier this year."

now that's how it's done

They nicked that whole article off "Class War" back when it was the Falklands/Thatcher/etc...

I liked the Mirror circa 2003 when it briefly shed its red top logo and was all brutally blunt 'Page 1-5' articles by John Pilger about the impending disaster in Iraq.

That phase didn't last long.

Yeah :(

omg i forgot that!

That period sucked!

they quite literally pissed it up against a wall (this pun almost works).

It was basically them going "Catherine Zeta Jones MORELIKE CATHERINE ZETA RUBBISH", and passing that off as political insight

Piers Morgan is an utter gobshite though

The review section of the Saturday Guardian is good. Otherwise, I occasionally buy the Herald Tribune.

Dom OTM

It was basically them going "Catherine Zeta Jones MORELIKE CATHERINE ZETA RUBBISH", and passing that off as political insight

-- Dom Passantino, Tuesday, 13 November 2007 14:43 (8 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

"catherine zeta jones = catherine zeta RUBBISH" haha if only all papers, celeb mags etc were more like this.

I voted for the guardian.

FT is the only British paper I've bought in years - in fact I bought it as recently as a couple of weeks ago. As Ed says, it's easy to decode, and it's also a little less full of complete space-wasting crap.

Can we have a Worst British Newspaper poll so I can vote with a tiny bit of enthusiasm (for the Indy)?

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

shit forgot to vote Daily Mail

Wow. If I'd been asked to order the papers from best to worst, that's exactly how I'd have done it.

Even the zeros are in the right order...

(although is the DM better than the DE? hmmmm...)

Oh god no. You have to admire that DE ability to write splash stories about Diana every Sunday, without fail, for a year.

lol death of the newspaper

also: lol stet being awake at 9.46am! WTF, dude?

whoa shock result

i'm tempted to start a follow-up poll: when was the last time any of you actually paid money for a physical copy of the guardian, then?

Right, who voted for The Times?

I bought a physical copy og the guardian yesterday. I often buy one if I know I'm going to have a coffee or something on my own and I don't want to have to read what the cafe has to offer (usually Metro).

Right, who voted for The Times?

-- Tom D., Tuesday, November 20, 2007 11:48 AM (8 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

srsly