With the state of world news what it is today it can be easy to get swallowed up by the doom, gloom and bullsh*t of it all. That’s why it’s important to take each new bit of information as it comes and read it through a (salt-laced) critical lense. I love the use of satire sites for this exact purpose, they highlight the ridiculousness of current events and especially of the other ‘reputable’ news sources that cover them.
From the snappy and absurd coverage of the Daily Mash to the more in depth and nuanced pieces of The Onion and onto the irreverent fun-poking of Mook News; satire sites never fail to make me laugh and bring me back to a better sense of perspective. However, as I write for an app website my mind always wanders into how to better adapt these comedic gems into the world of tech and whether it would even be necessary.
The Onion briefly attempted launching an app of their own but due to poor reviews and underwhelming download numbers they quickly sacked the project and went back to operating old school. The Daily Mash have left theirs running but with a one-star rating on iTunes it’s quickly heading to a similar fate.
Mook news however, is a relative newcomer to the world of satire; launching late last year the creators explain that they were spurred on by the exasperatingly poor and biased coverage of the American election. Claiming that if the news was going to be fake it may as well be funny, they quickly created a stream of tongue-in-cheek click-baitable articles in the hope of highlighting the absurdity of the mainstream media today. Free from any of the annoying pop-ups and banner ads of its predecessors, Mook News is becoming a firm favourite amongst its readers. Although there has been no mention of a plan to expand to an app version of the site, I believe that with Mook News’s unique, alchemic format that they’d have a better chance of succeeding.
So do satire sites need an app? Jury is still out on that one but past signs are pointing to no. That being said, I’ll happily remain on the fence and eagerly await the right site to change my mind.
