While I do have Ground News installed on my iPad, I only use it as a widget to let me know what’s going on. The sources it uses are generally not that great. Either the site is severely biased or the site is riddled with ads and pop ups. Basically every time I go to read an article it’s full of shit. I’ll give it credit as a substantial aggregator but it’s still pulling from sources that use click bait headlines. It’s not any better than social media.
If a news outlet has indicated to me that they care more about ad revenue than reporting news, I avoid them.
If the only way an outlet feels they can get readership is with use of clickbait headlines, I avoid them.
If the headline is something like “you’ll never guess why ___ hates this” or “the reason you can’t blahblahblah” or some other salacious bullshit or they have a super cringe thumbnail on their YT video, I avoid them.
If a writer misconstrues the words of a celebrity or political leader for their own narrative, I avoid them.
If their bias prevents them from reporting the facts of an event, I avoid them.
“Avoid” does not mean never visit. It means I try not to and if I do I proceed with caution and skepticism with the intent to get another source.
If I’m searching for a news story, it’s probably because I came across it on social media (Lemmy) or a blog and want to get credible information. Or because someone here is quoting a story and I have a hunch they’re misinformed. I use DuckDuckGo and generally get decent reputable results at the top. At its face, I will never trust Google for fact checking. If I end up at a wiki page, I often check their sources.
I have an extensive list of reputable and/or diverse outlets in my RSS reader. The only “mainstream” American sources are NYT, AP, NPR, and Reuters. I’ve been using BigNews as my RSS reader for a year or so now. I really like its simple interface and ability to subscribe to newsletters. Newsletters are sometimes the best way to get a blurb off the news without subscribing to something like NYT. If I’m compelled enough, I’ll run a paywalled article through archive.is.
I don’t feel that people publishing on substack or medium, etc are reputable outlets for general news. That’s great for specific topics, opinions, and focused reporting.
The only news I pay for is my local newspaper. In addition to local reporting, they curate AP articles.