Since I'm bitching about online stuff, I figure I might as well get this one out there too.

Apple has done something recently to the News app. I don't live in News, but when I have a few idle moments, I'll check it to see what's going on.

It's apparently now much more "algorithmically" driven, because I'm not seeing "breaking" news or "headline" news, I'm seeing stuff it thinks I'd like. I'm just trying to see what's going on.

That's not the worst thing though.

The worst thing is that I'll be scanning the posters or thumbnails or whatever you call them, and if I see something interesting, I don't click on it instantly, I'm still scanning the opening screen.

When all of a sudden, it "updates." Everything I was just looking at disappears. It seems as though it scrolls down, though I swear I can't find stuff I saw just before it updated. Stuff I wanted to read.

Happens every single time. It's to the point where I'm just not going to bother looking at the thing anymore. Right now, I open the app and just wait until it refreshes before I start reading it. It's a waste of my time.

I pay for that all-in-one tier with Apple Games, News+, iCloud storage, Apple Music and Apple TV+. I'll have to do the math, but I don't play the games. I don't listen to Apple Music. But access to many of the magazines and newspapers on News+ made that feel worthwhile, and with iCloud and TV+ I think I was still netting out ahead. And I'm doing family sharing with my daughter, which is actually also a pain in the ass. I wind up paying for all her app purchases, movie rentals and app subscriptions. I may just pay separately for cloud storage and TV+, and if they didn't have such good shows, I'd drop that too.

I'm starting to really feel genuinely and sincerely hostile toward Apple. The Apple user experience is rapidly deteriorating.

Maybe I'm just a grumpy old man shouting at clouds, but it really feels like it's getting worse.