New York Times:
Apple has waded into the messy world of news with a service that is read regularly by roughly 90 million people. But while Google, Facebook and Twitter have come under intense scrutiny for their disproportionate — and sometimes harmful — influence over the spread of information, Apple has so far avoided controversy. One big reason is that while its Silicon Valley peers rely on machines and algorithms to pick headlines, Apple uses humans like Ms. Kern.
The former journalist has quietly become one of the most powerful figures in English-language media. The stories she and her deputies select for Apple News regularly receive more than a million visits each.
Curation, human or otherwise, is great if you agree with the methods or algorithms of the curator. It can be dangerous otherwise.
Dangerous how? Is The Loop dangerous? Is Daring Fireball? All of these news sites can be found separately. Apple has zero monopoly on the news. Same for their upstart content for TV. If they want to be the old Disney for entertainment, more power to them. They in no way will prevent anyone from seeking out whatever entertainment they want. I’d rather have a human curate this via set guidelines rather than an algorithm that only rewards profit.
How is this radical? Facebook did the same thing. They moved to algorithms when there was controversy about their human curators being biased to the left.
Also, what is described here is the job description of a newspaper/magazine editor. Not exactly a radical discovery.