[standerman]

I was a regular reader of ZH for a long stretch leading up to the 2012 election and in my opinion their content is toxic and fuels paranoia. Lots of "end stage capitalism" and "prepper" type content. From my perspective now it definitely seems like the type of content that could be considered intentionally manipulative in a very negative way. It was very fear driven and I don't think that is healthy.

[rrmm]

Yeah, I had seen links to ZH from top-notch economic blogs I followed during the recession, so I was surprised when they started popping up as sources for all my favorite crazy conspiracy Youtubers.

Their content at this point spans the gamut from needlessly contrarian to peddling propaganda. I gather ZH is doing it for the page views, because stories like that get plenty of traffic.

[heisenbit]

It is not a news site but a fight club (their positioning). And over the years more and more people not worth fighting have aggregated there. It is in some way an anarchistic experiment and the longer it runs the sadder it looks. I learned a lot during the early years and I learned a lot by observing how they developed.