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What is a good source of information? By that I mean: - not about daily information (which are usually as fast as possible and don’t take the time to really un

What is a good source of information? By that I mean: - not about daily information (which are usually as fast as possible and don’t take the time to really understand the situation) - not biased - not about juicy news, but world topics that are ~objectively important I feel like there should be a subreddit for that.

theWheez 8y ago
I have not found something like this on the internet, but if it exists I'd love to know about it. Otherwise, books are the only place that fill out those qualifications.
GuiA 8y ago
A few suggestions: academic papers, books, documentaries (including indie produced ones on Youtube), radio shows/podcasts.
jwr 8y ago
Every source of information will be biased, and you have to take that into account by being critical. I found that the best source for me is The Economist: once per week, written by smart people, with good summaries of anything that is important. Delivered digitally (with an excellent audio version, too). It is "biased" in the sense that the editors hold a set of opinions and you have to be aware of it. I do not agree with all of their opinions, but I am aware of them. The news useful even if you disagree with their interpretation or recommendations. Surprisingly, it is the only intelligent and non-sensational news source that I have found.
- f055 8y ago
  I went from The Economist to Foreign Affairs few years ago when Eco became unbearably filled with an agenda. You might want to check FA out.
  - sixo 8y ago
    Can you describe their agenda, or point to a description of it? It's conspicuously centrist and pro-global-capitalism (see: articles essentially saying "human lives on earth has definitely gotten better under capitalism" (and not explicitly saying "world-average QoL is the correct metric by which to measure progress", nor addressing counterfactual hypotheses), + anti-trump + pretty skeptical of brexit. These are sort of acceptable, manageable biases to my eye: is there more I'm missing?
    - l9k 8y ago
      The Economist is somehow accused to have a bias in every direction. Some would call it "Ecommunist"pushing a far-left agenda, others decrying a right capitalist ideology.
    - dolessdrugs 8y ago
      Everyone has a different level of "acceptable, manageable biases"
- SuddsMcDuff 8y ago
  > "Every source of information will be biased, and you have to take that into account by being critical." A thousand times this. Bias is everywhere. I think people who say they're looking for an 'unbiased' source of information are really looking for a source of information they can just blindly consume without doing any pesky thinking. And if you're blindly consuming information without thinking, you're allowing someone else to think for you.
- athrun 8y ago
  I really like their Audio edition: it's a full version of the paper voiced by pro actors. I don't understand why this isn't more common. I'm already spending 8-hours a day at work, reading stuff or parsing information in some ways. I have found that I have no mental capacity left to read a full newspaper on top of that. Listening to a podcast while commuting is way less exhausting (to me at least).
AndrewOMartin 8y ago
There is no source that ticks all boxes, you have to resign yourself to being well informed about a small number of things and become active in that community, for all other things simply take it on trust and be wary.
throwawaymath 8y ago
I can tell you what I do: 1. I don't consume any news from televised sources, 2. I read Foreign Policy, Wall Street Journal, New York Times, The Economist and Foreign Affairs, 3. I'm generally skeptical of everything I read and I try to assume every article's author has many unknown unknowns in their reporting (to counter Gelman Amnesia), 4. Every so often (once a week or so), I read something from a news source I actively distrust just to see what else a nontrivial portion of the population believes about the world. This isn't perfect, but if you have the free time to do that much reading I think it gets you pretty close to well-rounded. I think the only major way to improve upon this would be to add another major news source from another country for additional foreign perspective (this is why I like The Economist and Financial Times).
- smokeyj 8y ago
  Guessing you didn't read GP's link..
- b0bby_tabl3s 8y ago
  ALL of #2 are very liberal leaning if not fully. You might consider rounding that out a bit? Check out Al Jazeera feeds, they have some good tidbits on there.
0xferruccio 8y ago
Here's my secret stash: - https://www.quantamagazine.org https://www.quantamagazine.org - science-y - https://thebrowser.com https://thebrowser.com - sometimes too intellectual or focused on literature - https://waitbutwhy.com https://waitbutwhy.com - sometimes too simple - https://www.project-syndicate.org https://www.project-syndicate.org - sometimes written by people that are "talkers/politicians" not "doers" - https://www.gwern.net https://www.gwern.net - The monthly newsletter is great - https://chinai.substack.com https://chinai.substack.com - Chinese Papers and AI news translated - https://www.ribbonfarm.com https://www.ribbonfarm.com - great long form essays I also got asked a couple of times about starting my own monthly mailing list with the most interesting things I find. If you'd be interested in receiving it email me at hi[at]ferrucc[dot]io
- Jaruzel 8y ago
  https://www.quantamagazine.org https://www.quantamagazine.org looks good. Thanks!
  - 0xferruccio 8y ago
    you're welcome :)
nazka 8y ago
Hard to go wrong with these two: - NPR: https://www.npr.org https://www.npr.org - Reuters: https://www.reuters.com https://www.reuters.com They can be a little bit dry sometimes but that's what professional neutral news has to be. I like also: - Bloomberg: https://www.bloomberg.com https://www.bloomberg.com - And Politico: https://www.politico.com https://www.politico.com And finally a financial blog I love, Matt Levine Money Stuff (it's free from his newsletter): http://link.mail.bloombergbusiness.com/join/4wm/moneystuff-signup?source=msweb http://link.mail.bloombergbusiness.com/join/4wm/moneystuff-s...
- smokeyj 8y ago
  Did you read GP's link? And you came to this conclusion?
  - craftyguy 8y ago
    To be fair, they were replying to a request for news sources..
ChaseT 8y ago
I think one of the takeaway's from Aaron's piece is that there IS no universally good source of information. That's okay, because the news you need to hear or that actually impacts you will make it's way to you through hearsay. The people you talk to in real life are a good filter. If you like podcasts, there's a nice discussion here http://www.hellointernet.fm/podcast/11 http://www.hellointernet.fm/podcast/11
zabana 8y ago
I'm not entirely sure non-biased publications exist. In a perfect world they would be a thing but in the world of humans quite impossible. As for my criteria: - I usually look at who owns the publication to get a sense of its positions in terms of important global affairs. - Are they reporting all the facts or simply "lying by omission" (which tends to be a very popular tactic these days, especially when it comes to geopolitical topics). - Balance, or what I like to call gray journalism. Because nothing is totally black or white in life. I'm of the opinion that the Internet simply killed traditional journalism, because now anybody (given the time) can go and check the facts for any given story published by the media.
smokeyj 8y ago
> What is a good source of information? Pamphlets. Road signs. Safety labels. As a general criteria, I would add "promotes action". What good is information if it doesn't bring any change?
xsr24 8y ago
https://www.democracynow.org/ https://www.democracynow.org/
bashmydotfiles 8y ago
You should check out allsides[0]. It's a new aggregator that presents news from the left, right, and center. They're constantly reevaluating what side of the spectrum news sources land on. They post about their findings and explain why they consider a new source left, center, or right. [0]: https://www.allsides.com/unbiased-balanced-news https://www.allsides.com/unbiased-balanced-news
- jacquesm 8y ago
  You could possibly automate an aggregator that takes the various sources, see what at least all of them agree on and then spit that out as 'just the facts'.
  - tangent128 8y ago
    That algorithm empowers any source to suppress an inconvenient fact by making a baseless assertion of the contrary.
samzub 8y ago
One of the papers I like reading is the monthly "Le Monde diplomatique". https://mondediplo.com/ https://mondediplo.com/ It has in-depth analysis of current events and world topics, and is a nice mix of recent news and long-term stories. I often find myself looking for more information after reading one of their articles, as they often include a lot of references to other topics or events I am not familiar with : it feeds my curiosity this way, and I get to read various news source about one topic.
ForHackernews 8y ago
Since 1998: https://aldaily.com/ https://aldaily.com/
peterwwillis 8y ago
If you're into radio, PRI's The World (https://www.pri.org/programs/the-world https://www.pri.org/programs/the-world) and the BBC World Service (https://www.bbc.co.uk/worldserviceradio https://www.bbc.co.uk/worldserviceradio) both do a great job covering world news, as well as the Associated Press, Reuters, Al Jazeera, and the Christian Science Monitor.
tracker1 8y ago
There is no such thing as unbiased... fact-based is often as close as you will get, which is increasingly rare.
tyu1000 8y ago
I like business news in general. You make money in finance by being right and people in the industry will gravitate towards accurate sources by definition. In general, business news tends to have the best qualified hosts as well, who can actually understand macroeconomic concepts.

theWheez 8y ago

I have not found something like this on the internet, but if it exists I'd love to know about it. Otherwise, books are the only place that fill out those qualifications.

GuiA 8y ago

A few suggestions: academic papers, books, documentaries (including indie produced ones on Youtube), radio shows/podcasts.

jwr 8y ago

Every source of information will be biased, and you have to take that into account by being critical. I found that the best source for me is The Economist: once per week, written by smart people, with good summaries of anything that is important. Delivered digitally (with an excellent audio version, too). It is "biased" in the sense that the editors hold a set of opinions and you have to be aware of it. I do not agree with all of their opinions, but I am aware of them. The news useful even if you disagree with their interpretation or recommendations. Surprisingly, it is the only intelligent and non-sensational news source that I have found.

f055 8y ago
I went from The Economist to Foreign Affairs few years ago when Eco became unbearably filled with an agenda. You might want to check FA out.
- sixo 8y ago
  Can you describe their agenda, or point to a description of it? It's conspicuously centrist and pro-global-capitalism (see: articles essentially saying "human lives on earth has definitely gotten better under capitalism" (and not explicitly saying "world-average QoL is the correct metric by which to measure progress", nor addressing counterfactual hypotheses), + anti-trump + pretty skeptical of brexit. These are sort of acceptable, manageable biases to my eye: is there more I'm missing?
  - l9k 8y ago
    The Economist is somehow accused to have a bias in every direction. Some would call it "Ecommunist"pushing a far-left agenda, others decrying a right capitalist ideology.
  - dolessdrugs 8y ago
    Everyone has a different level of "acceptable, manageable biases"
SuddsMcDuff 8y ago
> "Every source of information will be biased, and you have to take that into account by being critical." A thousand times this. Bias is everywhere. I think people who say they're looking for an 'unbiased' source of information are really looking for a source of information they can just blindly consume without doing any pesky thinking. And if you're blindly consuming information without thinking, you're allowing someone else to think for you.
athrun 8y ago
I really like their Audio edition: it's a full version of the paper voiced by pro actors. I don't understand why this isn't more common. I'm already spending 8-hours a day at work, reading stuff or parsing information in some ways. I have found that I have no mental capacity left to read a full newspaper on top of that. Listening to a podcast while commuting is way less exhausting (to me at least).

AndrewOMartin 8y ago

There is no source that ticks all boxes, you have to resign yourself to being well informed about a small number of things and become active in that community, for all other things simply take it on trust and be wary.

throwawaymath 8y ago

I can tell you what I do: 1. I don't consume any news from televised sources, 2. I read Foreign Policy, Wall Street Journal, New York Times, The Economist and Foreign Affairs, 3. I'm generally skeptical of everything I read and I try to assume every article's author has many unknown unknowns in their reporting (to counter Gelman Amnesia), 4. Every so often (once a week or so), I read something from a news source I actively distrust just to see what else a nontrivial portion of the population believes about the world. This isn't perfect, but if you have the free time to do that much reading I think it gets you pretty close to well-rounded. I think the only major way to improve upon this would be to add another major news source from another country for additional foreign perspective (this is why I like The Economist and Financial Times).

smokeyj 8y ago
Guessing you didn't read GP's link..
b0bby_tabl3s 8y ago
ALL of #2 are very liberal leaning if not fully. You might consider rounding that out a bit? Check out Al Jazeera feeds, they have some good tidbits on there.

0xferruccio 8y ago

Here's my secret stash: - https://www.quantamagazine.org https://www.quantamagazine.org - science-y - https://thebrowser.com https://thebrowser.com - sometimes too intellectual or focused on literature - https://waitbutwhy.com https://waitbutwhy.com - sometimes too simple - https://www.project-syndicate.org https://www.project-syndicate.org - sometimes written by people that are "talkers/politicians" not "doers" - https://www.gwern.net https://www.gwern.net - The monthly newsletter is great - https://chinai.substack.com https://chinai.substack.com - Chinese Papers and AI news translated - https://www.ribbonfarm.com https://www.ribbonfarm.com - great long form essays I also got asked a couple of times about starting my own monthly mailing list with the most interesting things I find. If you'd be interested in receiving it email me at hi[at]ferrucc[dot]io

Jaruzel 8y ago
https://www.quantamagazine.org https://www.quantamagazine.org looks good. Thanks!
- 0xferruccio 8y ago
  you're welcome :)

nazka 8y ago

Hard to go wrong with these two: - NPR: https://www.npr.org https://www.npr.org - Reuters: https://www.reuters.com https://www.reuters.com They can be a little bit dry sometimes but that's what professional neutral news has to be. I like also: - Bloomberg: https://www.bloomberg.com https://www.bloomberg.com - And Politico: https://www.politico.com https://www.politico.com And finally a financial blog I love, Matt Levine Money Stuff (it's free from his newsletter): http://link.mail.bloombergbusiness.com/join/4wm/moneystuff-signup?source=msweb http://link.mail.bloombergbusiness.com/join/4wm/moneystuff-s...

smokeyj 8y ago
Did you read GP's link? And you came to this conclusion?
- craftyguy 8y ago
  To be fair, they were replying to a request for news sources..

ChaseT 8y ago

I think one of the takeaway's from Aaron's piece is that there IS no universally good source of information. That's okay, because the news you need to hear or that actually impacts you will make it's way to you through hearsay. The people you talk to in real life are a good filter. If you like podcasts, there's a nice discussion here http://www.hellointernet.fm/podcast/11 http://www.hellointernet.fm/podcast/11

zabana 8y ago

I'm not entirely sure non-biased publications exist. In a perfect world they would be a thing but in the world of humans quite impossible. As for my criteria: - I usually look at who owns the publication to get a sense of its positions in terms of important global affairs. - Are they reporting all the facts or simply "lying by omission" (which tends to be a very popular tactic these days, especially when it comes to geopolitical topics). - Balance, or what I like to call gray journalism. Because nothing is totally black or white in life. I'm of the opinion that the Internet simply killed traditional journalism, because now anybody (given the time) can go and check the facts for any given story published by the media.

smokeyj 8y ago

> What is a good source of information? Pamphlets. Road signs. Safety labels. As a general criteria, I would add "promotes action". What good is information if it doesn't bring any change?

xsr24 8y ago

https://www.democracynow.org/ https://www.democracynow.org/

bashmydotfiles 8y ago

You should check out allsides[0]. It's a new aggregator that presents news from the left, right, and center. They're constantly reevaluating what side of the spectrum news sources land on. They post about their findings and explain why they consider a new source left, center, or right. [0]: https://www.allsides.com/unbiased-balanced-news https://www.allsides.com/unbiased-balanced-news

jacquesm 8y ago
You could possibly automate an aggregator that takes the various sources, see what at least all of them agree on and then spit that out as 'just the facts'.
- tangent128 8y ago
  That algorithm empowers any source to suppress an inconvenient fact by making a baseless assertion of the contrary.

samzub 8y ago

One of the papers I like reading is the monthly "Le Monde diplomatique". https://mondediplo.com/ https://mondediplo.com/ It has in-depth analysis of current events and world topics, and is a nice mix of recent news and long-term stories. I often find myself looking for more information after reading one of their articles, as they often include a lot of references to other topics or events I am not familiar with : it feeds my curiosity this way, and I get to read various news source about one topic.

ForHackernews 8y ago

Since 1998: https://aldaily.com/ https://aldaily.com/

peterwwillis 8y ago

If you're into radio, PRI's The World (https://www.pri.org/programs/the-world https://www.pri.org/programs/the-world) and the BBC World Service (https://www.bbc.co.uk/worldserviceradio https://www.bbc.co.uk/worldserviceradio) both do a great job covering world news, as well as the Associated Press, Reuters, Al Jazeera, and the Christian Science Monitor.

tracker1 8y ago

There is no such thing as unbiased... fact-based is often as close as you will get, which is increasingly rare.

tyu1000 8y ago

I like business news in general. You make money in finance by being right and people in the industry will gravitate towards accurate sources by definition. In general, business news tends to have the best qualified hosts as well, who can actually understand macroeconomic concepts.