Is El Reg georestricting stories?

This topic was created by Dan 55 .

[Dan 55]

Is El Reg georestricting stories?

So, I connect via US VPN and I notice two stories aren't on the front page:

Elite name on Brit scene sponsors retro video games preservation project at the Centre for Computing History

Couldn't come at a better time as Cambridge museum remains closed

13 – lucky for some, but not BT because that's how hard pre-tax profits crashed in Q1

COVID-19 ravages former state monopoly as nearly all divisions shrink

Then I disconnect, refresh, and the two UK-centric stories are back (along with another cookie popup).

Is there/will there be an option to turn this off, I quite like reading about stuff happening elsewhere in the world... or, indeed, my part of the world if I'm using a VPN which many people working for corporate behemoths will have to do.

[jake]

Re: Is El Reg georestricting stories?

I've noticed this occasionally over the years, but not enough to comment on it.

The "missing" articles are (almost?) always in /Week/, and are always available under their various sub headings, in this case /bootnotes/ and /data_center/networks/

The way I see it, the front page variations are similar to the ages-old practice of localized versions of dead-tree newspapers, and aren't really anything to worry about. There are only so many column-inches to put stories into[0]. If you think you absolutely, positively must see all the articles, use /Week/ ... Obviously EReg may have another explanation.

Besides, sometimes page three is more important than the front page ... ElReg is still a red-top, after all.

[0] Yes, I know that digital publications don't have the same physical size limitations as dead-tree newspapers ... but humans will only scroll so far.

[diodesign]

Re: Is El Reg georestricting stories?

Further to add what Marco posted, out of the 500-ish stories we typically publish a month, a handful are marked US, UK, or Australia-only on the front page.

It's mainly so that, for instance, if you live in America, you don't wake up to a UK-dominated front page about stuff you've never heard of, and vice-versa.

You can still find all stories in the Latest News page and other pages that aren't regionalized. And in future, we'll adjust the homepage design so that all the news is listed but the stuff we want to highlight is tailored for where you are in the world.

C.

[Dan 55]

Re: Is El Reg georestricting stories?

Why on earth were you downvoted for your explanation?

I'll start using the Latest News section as the home page until the next redesign, it's what I've been doing on Eurogamer anyway.

[jake]

Re: Is El Reg georestricting stories?

"Why on earth were you downvoted for your explanation?"

Because some people apparently think that downvoting a post negates that post without a need to make a rational argument against it.

No, it doesn't make any sense to me, either.

[Marco Fontani]

Jake already eloquently put it :)

ElReg's homepage has three "editions": US/CA, AU/NZ and GB/Rest Of World.

The US and GB editions have been there from the start best I can tell; the AU edition is a bit more recent - it's only 10 years (and a few days) old.

When visiting the homepage you see a region-filtered view of what's been recently published for the homepage. So if you're visiting from the US you may see some stories which are mostly relevant to the US public, and mostly useless to a GB or AU (or indeed RoW) audience. Same goes for AU: some news are more appropriate for readers down under.

If you really want to read everything regardless of whether it's shown on the homepage for an edition, you can either look at the sections - which don't have editions, or at the Latest News page, which contains all the stories published in the last seven days, regardless of edition.