I used to read the Grauniad, but I've become distrustful of it over the past few years because of how aggressively it panders to my sensibilities and biases. Also, it doesn't pursue any story more than any other broadsheet would; it's just a matter of what stories it chooses to pursue.
That feels a little bit reductive, at least given that non-English news is precisely what big part of population is going to consume. There isn't even an unified market for news content given the language boundaries.
Not to say there aren't many shallow, clickbait sources, but there're good ones as well.
The better educated somebody is, the more likely they are to have reasonably fluency in English. There are some great non-English sources out there, but English is the most read language by well educated people.
Not saying there are not great news content in other languages. However English should be expected to dominate over the whole world.
This is a bizarre take. Newspapers, even really good ones, generally don't target international readers. They target their home country's readers. How many Englishmen are interested in the machinations of unions in Paris? How many Frenchmen?
Obviously the best coverage will be in the country's majority language.
The best coverage for a country will be in that countries language.
However for world events coverage English is the more likely language. For niches that might interest you English might be the only option since odds are someone in every country speaks English and reports on that niche. (odds, but no guarantee)
> However for world events coverage English is the more likely language
Can you explain how you arrived at this conclusion?
Certainly when I lived in Japan and picked up a copy of the Yomiuri Shimbun, the world events coverage was in Japanese. And when I've traveled in France, Le Monde was entirely in French. The international section didn't become English.
> For niches that might interest you
I'm not sure you're talking about newspapers at this point.
Regarding "research.com", which is linked from the article: this is weird - some random observations...:
• Donald E. Knuth, the most eminent computer scientist alive, ranked 92nd (!) in computer science - seems off by about two orders of magnitde.
• Noam A. Chomsky, of whom some say he is the most-cited scholar alive (on the level of Aristotle), ranked seventh in the US. He gave theoretical computer science the Chomsky hierarchy and the Chomsky Normal Form, he has been called the "father of modern linguistics" (Hewbrew morphology, generative grammars, competence-performance distinction, Universal grammar, government & binding theory, the review of Skinner's book that single-handedly destroyed behaviorism, the 'minimalist' program, ...), in politology he is a long-standing and perhaps the most ardent and vocal critic of US foreign policy, supporter of Palestine (being a Jew himself), and in communications and media studies his book (with Herman) "manufactoring Consent" is a field-defining classic. - https://research.com/u/noam-chomsky
• regarding school rankings, in Germany, KIT (Karlsruhe Inst. of Technology) seems missing entirely, a top place in CS research.
While the U.S. are one of the largest American countries, they are not as United as they used to be, and they have never been the largest of the world (that'd be Russia) nor America (that'd be Canada: "second-largest country by total area, with the longest coastline of any country." (Wikipedia)).
Engl. "weird" (happen, to become) ~ German "werden" (will [be]).
Regarding irregularity of the English language, there's the well-known urban poem:
Dearest creature in creation,
Study English pronunciation.
I will teach you in my verse
Sounds like corpse, corps, horse, and worse.
I will keep you, Suzy, busy,
Make your head with heat grow dizzy.
Tear in eye, your dress will tear.
So shall I! Oh hear my prayer.
Just compare heart, beard, and heard,
Dies and diet, lord and word,
Sword and sward, retain and Britain.
(Mind the latter, how it's written.)
Now I surely will not plague you
With such words as plaque and ague.
But be careful how you speak:
Say break and steak, but bleak and streak;
Cloven, oven, how and low,
Script, receipt, show, poem, and toe.
Hear me say, devoid of trickery,
Daughter, laughter, and Terpsichore,
Typhoid, measles, topsails, aisles,
Exiles, similes, and reviles;
Scholar, vicar, and cigar,
Solar, mica, war and far;
One, anemone, Balmoral,
Kitchen, lichen, laundry, laurel;
Gertrude, German, wind and mind,
Scene, Melpomene, mankind.
Billet does not rhyme with ballet,
Bouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet.
Blood and flood are not like food,
Nor is mould like should and would.
Viscous, viscount, load and broad,
Toward, to forward, to reward.
And your pronunciation's OK
When you correctly say croquet,
Rounded, wounded, grieve and sieve,
Friend and fiend, alive and live.
Ivy, privy, famous; clamour
And enamour rhymes with hammer.
River, rival, tomb, bomb, comb,
Doll and roll and some and home.
Stranger does not rhyme with anger,
Neither does devour with clangour.
Souls but foul, haunt but aunt,
Font, front, wont, want, grand, and grant,
Shoes, goes, does. Now first say finger,
And then singer, ginger, linger,
Real, zeal, mauve, gauze, gouge and gauge,
Marriage, foliage, mirage, and age.
Query does not rhyme with very,
Nor does fury sound like bury.
Dost, lost, post and doth, cloth, loth.
Job, nob, bosom, transom, oath.
Though the differences seem little,
We say actual but victual.
Refer does not rhyme with deafer.
Foeffer does, and zephyr, heifer.
Mint, pint, senate and sedate;
Dull, bull, and George ate late.
Scenic, Arabic, Pacific,
Science, conscience, scientific.
Liberty, library, heave and heaven,
Rachel, ache, moustache, eleven.
We say hallowed, but allowed,
People, leopard, towed, but vowed.
Mark the differences, moreover,
Between mover, cover, clover;
Leeches, breeches, wise, precise,
Chalice, but police and lice;
Camel, constable, unstable,
Principle, disciple, label.
Petal, panel, and canal,
Wait, surprise, plait, promise, pal.
Worm and storm, chaise, chaos, chair,
Senator, spectator, mayor.
Tour, but our and succour, four.
Gas, alas, and Arkansas.
Sea, idea, Korea, area,
Psalm, Maria, but malaria.
Youth, south, southern, cleanse and clean.
Doctrine, turpentine, marine.
Compare alien with Italian,
Dandelion and battalion.
Sally with ally, yea, ye,
Eye, I, ay, aye, whey, and key.
Say aver, but ever, fever,
Neither, leisure, skein, deceiver.
Heron, granary, canary.
Crevice and device and aerie.
Face, but preface, not efface.
Phlegm, phlegmatic, ass, glass, bass.
Large, but target, gin, give, verging,
Ought, out, joust and scour, scourging.
Ear, but earn and wear and tear
Do not rhyme with here but ere.
Seven is right, but so is even,
Hyphen, roughen, nephew Stephen,
Monkey, donkey, Turk and jerk,
Ask, grasp, wasp, and cork and work.
Pronunciation -- think of Psyche!
Is a paling stout and spikey?
Won't it make you lose your wits,
Writing groats and saying grits?
It's a dark abyss or tunnel:
Strewn with stones, stowed, solace, gunwale,
Islington and Isle of Wight,
Housewife, verdict and indict.
Finally, which rhymes with enough?
Though, through, plough, or dough, or cough?
Hiccough has the sound of cup.
My advice is give it up!
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