Carl Franzen

And to be clear, I don't think any one person can create the future of news.

But I hope it points toward a future where humans + AI work together to offer a better way of publishing it.

Early days. Many bugs still to fix. Feedback welcome here and carlfranzen at gmail dot com

I was inspired by the example set by other vibe coding journalists including my former colleague @caseynewton.bsky.social, as well as @kevinroose.com, @weisenthal.bsky.social, Deirdre Bosa. Special thanks to my alpha testers @michaelnunez.bsky.social and Justin Miller — whose counsel was invaluable!

All of it was put together using @anthropic.com Claude Code and Opus 4.6! And "this guy" is me — I'm a busy dad/full-time journalist @venturebeat.com covering AI and wanted to test more hands-on myself. So I built One Big Story on nights and weekends. I have NO formal dev/coding experience.

The tech stack includes:

-NewsAPI for sources
-Groq + Llama 3.3 70B for filtering
-Perplexity Sonar Pro for longform
-FLUX Dev for images
-OpenAI TTS-1 for narration
-Hedra for AI influencer video
-Netlify + S3 infra for hosting

That's exactly why One Big Story was created. Here's how it works:

AI filters content, finds possible stories → Human editor reviews and selects best one → AI auto generates all 4 formats on-demand → User selects the one they want.

📖 Text
🎧 Podcast
🎬 Video
💬 Chatbot

What if instead of doing that, we used AI to filter across 150,000+ sources and find the single most important story that everyone on Earth should know about, that day — automatically?

AI used to focus rather than flood.

Tech that personalizes the format, not the facts.

We're facing an information literacy crisis. AI and other tech has made it possible to flood the zone with low quality content — aka "slop."

Stuff designed to titillate, inflame, and sell you more stuff rather than inform you. And we're all busy.

But AI doesn't have to be used in this way...

One Big Story - The Front Page of Earth Blizzard hits Northeast, millions affected by travel bans and heavy snow

Did this ONE guy just vibe-code the FUTURE OF NEWS? 😱

One site. One story per day — only the most important news on Earth. 1-2 sentences.

AI generates formats on-demand: longform article, podcast, AI influencer video, and live chatbot!!

ONE BIG STORY: onebigstory.xyz

Thanks for reading and sharing/writing in, Jim! Maybe I am too naive but I did ask xAI a bunch of questions about how Grok Biz/Enterprise is different than Grok on X. They have yet to respond. It's a big outstanding "question of trust" as the bard William Joel once said.

Replace your HR department with Grok for Business. Work is based now.

venturebeat.com/ai/musks-xai-...

Front Page Awards — THE NEWSWOMEN'S CLUB OF NEW YORK

The biggest kudos in the world to @leahfeiger.bsky.social, WIRED's unstoppable politics editor, who won the Front Page Award for Journalist of the Year today!

the most underrated inspirational Roman Emperor IMO is Zeno, who manages to survive three different usurpations, mass rioting, multiple rampaging enemy armies, massive religious dissension, wild unpopularity & some pretty engrained racism to die peacefully in his bed after 17 years on the throne

At least 90 people have died in flooding and landslides in Vietnam, which has been hit by 14 typhoons this year. A few decades ago, five was the average annual number of such storms.

normal planet

[🎁]

www.nytimes.com/2025/12/01/w...

Crypto Leaders Call For Infusion Of 20 Million Dopes To Stabilize Market BOSTON—Stressing that the move would help keep digital currencies liquid through the coming year, crypto leaders called for an infusion of 20 million dopes Thursday to stabilize the market. “We’re cal...

Crypto Leaders Call For Infusion Of 20 Million Dopes To Stabilize Market

President Biden to host AIDS Memorial Quilt on White House South Lawn for World AIDS Day (exclusive) The president and First Lady Jill Biden will host a public display of the Quilt for the first time on the South Lawn that people can visit and view.

I’d like to bring you back to a time, just one year ago, when the U.S. government recognized World AIDS Day & President Joe Biden hosted panels from the AIDS Memorial Quilt on the White House South Lawn.

Compared to today: the Trump admin refuses to acknowledge it.
www.advocate.com/news/white-h...

First use of fusha for a bullet since ~1979 -- daringfawnyball.wordpress.com/wp-content/u...

US agency will charge $45 fee for air passengers without REAL IDs The U.S. Transportation Security Administration said on Monday it will begin charging air travelers $45 on February 1 if their IDs do not meet stricter federal standards, a move aimed at encouraging travelers to get the enhanced identity documents.

US agency will charge $45 fee for air passengers without REAL IDs reut.rs/3Mxw7rG

Elizabeth Taylor in an 80s press conference speaking on the stigma of AIDS “…And it so angered me that I finally thought to myself, Bitch, do something yourself.” from the documentary “Elizabeth Taylor: The Lost Tapes.”

there’s a scene in the new documentary where Elizabeth Taylor is talking about the stigma of AIDS and how she got involved in the movement and it’s fucking everything

Congratulations to all the Democratic candidates who won tonight. It’s a reminder that when we come together around strong, forward-looking leaders who care about the issues that matter, we can win. We’ve still got plenty of work to do, but the future looks a little bit brighter.

Obama Calls Mamdani to Praise His Campaign and Offers to Be Sounding Board

President Obama called Zohran Mamdani on Saturday — praising his campaign and offering to be a "sounding board" into the future.

Obama said he was invested in Mamdani's success beyond the election on Tuesday.

"Your campaign has been impressive to watch," Obama told Mamdani.

is that billionaire grocery store dude packing up the uhaul

I have been charged in a federal indictment sought by the Department of Justice.

This political prosecution is an attack on all of our First Amendment rights. I’m not backing down, and we’re going to win.

In a shocking reality check, @wired.com is not, in fact, bankrolled by “donations from far left organizations.”

We actually rely on an amazing and growing audience of subscribers to support our journalism, so please subscribe to WIRED if you don’t already.

CHICAGO — Outside an elementary school during dismissal… horrifying. What have we become?

The map we've found unlocks the path to more portals.
Stay tuned as we're preparing new visualizations to share soon.

Pettiest man alive.

To be clear, the President of the United States has declared war on the City of Chicago.

bernie sanders and zohran mamdani

At the @zohrankmamdani.bsky.social / @sanders.senate.gov event at Brooklyn College. The two entered to thunderous applause.

checked linkedin to find that my sleep paralysis demon got promoted to sleep paralysis demon L3 two weeks ago