Buzzfeed, it ain't

April 19, 2014 11:42 AM

TheGuardian.com recently surpassed the 100 million Unique Visitor monthly threshold for the first time. To mark the occasion, its editors have compiled the 100 most read pieces of Guardian content since 2010. Refreshingly, the Top 100 is (mostly) click-bait and listicle-free. (Though a Top 100 is inherently click-bait and a listicle, innit?) Edward Snowden: The Whistleblower Behind the NSA Surveillance Revelations tops the list.
posted by wensink (13 comments total)

Here's to The Grauniad!
posted by GallonOfAlan at 11:49 AM on April 19, 2014 [1 favorite]

GallonOfAlan - you beat me to it.

Congratulations to the The Guardian!
posted by the_royal_we at 11:53 AM on April 19, 2014

I have a love/hate relationship with it - on the one hand no-one can argue that the NSA stories and similar investigative stuff was not top notch, and they have the best design team on the news-web by a country mile. On the other hand, much of that 100 million comes from CIF - a cesspool of half-baked half-unpaid "I have an opinion" click spam for anyone and their dog masquerading as journalism, reflected in the fact it lost £30million last year and its print edition circulation keeps falling.

I'd like it to stick around, if only because otherwise people on twitter might start linking to the telegraph website for basic news stories but honestly, this seems like partying on a very uncertain, slightly rotten ship.
posted by Another Fine Product From The Nonsense Factory at 12:34 PM on April 19, 2014 [4 favorites]

The Guardian has become one of the benchmarks for Journalism for me. Where other newspapers have sold out (I'm looking at you, the Times), they've consistently raised their game and are one of the few quality news sources remaining. Their online presence is fantastic and as an expat Brit, it's one of the touchstones for home for me.
posted by arcticseal at 12:35 PM on April 19, 2014 [5 favorites]

In this era of gigantic neolib corporatism, it's so reassuring to see a mainstream left newspaper not only surviving but consistently delivering investigative scoops that I'm happy to overlook its faults and occasional Mailish quality. They're only invulnerable to interference for as long as the trust's media group holds out, though, so I worry for their long-term future.
posted by forgetful snow at 12:54 PM on April 19, 2014 [1 favorite]

A list of urls instead of links?
posted by Segundus at 1:03 PM on April 19, 2014 [2 favorites]

It has been a big few weeks at the Guardian; first, they were named Newspaper Of The Year (a title they held a few years earlier), then, out of the blue, the US division jointly won a Pulitzer, and now this.

The Pulitzer win was announced a few days after the entire company had celebratory drinks for Newspaper Of The Year (booking out a nearby pub); to commemorate, the following day, everyone at Kings Place was called into the newsroom, where champagne was handed out and Alan Rusbridger gave a speech. The 100 million milestone was celebrated with a large '100m' appearing on the wall of the first-floor corridor and the bags of small easter eggs given out to staff having a "#guardian100m" tag.
posted by acb at 4:23 PM on April 19, 2014

Now all the Graun has to do is find a sustainable business model...
posted by Devonian at 5:37 PM on April 19, 2014

Now all the Graun has to do is find a sustainable business model...

I wouldn't worry too much. Their business model is considerably more sound than it was a few years ago (when the "bleeding £100k a day"/"bankrupt in five years" quotes came out). Losses have shrunk year over year, revenue is up and, with the Scott Trust having sold off the Auto Trader, it has enough cash to keep running the Guardian at its current levels of expenditure into the 2040s.
posted by acb at 6:22 PM on April 19, 2014

the US division jointly won a Pulitzer

Related post.
posted by homunculus at 1:35 AM on April 20, 2014

I have a CiF column - they do pay, and the comment section is actually quite good compared to, say, Reddit. Not only does the Graun give me a voice, it's not pigeonholed me into writing strictly about sex work. Writing my complex views into short pieces has given me a huge boost as a writer and encourages me to constantly improve. CiF publishes people who can't find a forum anywhere else, and the editors are incredibly patient and supportive.
posted by Mistress at 5:12 AM on April 20, 2014

I mean the comments section under each article. The quality of the authors' posts is, of course, far superior to most of Reddit :)
posted by Mistress at 5:22 AM on April 20, 2014

I know as a "typical Guardian reader" and an American, their football (soccer) coverage is some of the most consistent around. I was a little surprised that transfer deadline day live blogs were in the top 100 list, but then I remembered what I do most transfer deadline days: Stay glued to the Guardian. I do read other sections, but the first page I load after I wake up is Guardian Football.
posted by kendrak at 8:18 AM on April 20, 2014