Topic: WorldNetDaily
It's taken nearly two years after the start of its current, ongoing financial crisis, but WorldNetDaily has finally -- finally -- created a formal subscription option for readers.
As described in a Nov. 18 article, the "WND Insider" program offers ad-free content for a minimum of $50 a year, with higher subscription levels offering things like discounts at its online store and subscriptions to its sparsely read Whistleblower magazine. Of course, in making that announcement, WND made sure to portray itself as a victim of "Big Tech":
WND is currently under greater attack than ever by Big Tech, which wants to destroy the internet’s oldest independent news website.
But we have a solution.
First, a few of the latest assaults:
- Since early September, Facebook has massively suppressed WND’s traffic – down to about 10% of what it was previously on Facebook. This hurts us tremendously. When asked repeatedly why WND has been put in “Facebook jail,” the social media giant’s reps offer no reason – ever.
- During the same period, three major online advertising companies – TripleLift, AppNexus/Xander and Teads – all simultaneously “canceled” their engagement with WND, citing vague breaches of their terms of service (one company said WND engages in “hate speech”), which has seriously reduced the ad revenue on which we rely to fund WND’s operation and pay our journalists.
- Google has written WND out of its search algorithm so thoroughly that unless you specify “WND.com” in your search terms, a WND story rarely shows up.
Other examples abound but you get the idea.
WND is deliberately vague about exactly why it faces such issues -- because it publishes fake news, as we point out every time WND insists that it doesn't. But it's still trying to gaslight its readers by insisting that it's the non-right-wing media that's the real "fake news" and that WND is the "desperately needed counterbalance":
For those who may be somewhat new to WorldNetDaily (WND): Since 1997, before almost all other online news sites even existed, WND has provided a desperately needed counterbalance to the one-sided, dishonest and ever more unhinged fake news media. WND is staffed by veteran professional journalists who, unlike most of today’s media, are unapologetically Christian, pro-American and pro-Constitution. In the last two decades, we have broken many huge stories, defended the Constitution, championed Americans’ God-given rights, boldly upheld the sanctity of life, exposed corruption and abuse, and endeavored to fulfill the Founding Fathers’ notion of a truly free press.
The Founding Fathers probably didn't support a "free press" that is as blatantly biased and has published as many falsehoods as WND.
