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Regardless of the discussion on "fake news" or "not so fake news" or "trustworthy news" I found the ration of signal vs. noise for my personal life to just not

Regardless of the discussion on "fake news" or "not so fake news" or "trustworthy news" I found the ration of signal vs. noise for my personal life to just not justify news consume. If I was consuming about 30 pieces of news per day (and that is not so much actually) I would consume nearly 11.000 news pieces per year. I was asking myself: "How many of the news pieces I consumed did actually influence any relevant decision I made?" The answer in that given year was three, max. four. So of nearly 11.000 data points only 3 or 4 were actionable enough to influence a more or less important decision? This was the reason I switched from a "just in case" mindset (I need to know this, just in case it might become important - also called "FOMO: Fear of missing out") to a "just in time" mindset. If something is of any particular interest to me - I start to investigate the context. To then be able to come to a valid decision.

Faark 8y ago
I emphasize with not having a good idea on what and how much news to consume. Especially developing news... just reading the summary afterwards seems way less time consuming. A digital counterpart to a weekly newspapers, doing the selecting, would be nice. I haven't found a convenient way to do that, yet. Would love recommendations. But we cannot just ignore news at all... there must be some minimum time to invest. Democracy can only work if your choice in the voting booth is actually informed. For that, journalism seems to be the best of the bad options we have. Most comments in this thread painting it as worthless or worse is downright scary.
- sdoering 8y ago
  > Democracy can only work if your choice in the voting booth is actually informed. I am totally with you on that. But I also believe, that I am able to inform me "just in time". When I read about the least years, read the party programs, read the proposals and the essayists discussing them. I do this in the weeks leading up to an election. And - we are imho lucky to have this in Germany - am able to use an online tool to check all party programs against the things important to me in a kind of "who fits best" tool. This is done by an independent organisation and is nowadays kind of an institution by itself.

Faark 8y ago

I emphasize with not having a good idea on what and how much news to consume. Especially developing news... just reading the summary afterwards seems way less time consuming. A digital counterpart to a weekly newspapers, doing the selecting, would be nice. I haven't found a convenient way to do that, yet. Would love recommendations. But we cannot just ignore news at all... there must be some minimum time to invest. Democracy can only work if your choice in the voting booth is actually informed. For that, journalism seems to be the best of the bad options we have. Most comments in this thread painting it as worthless or worse is downright scary.

sdoering 8y ago
> Democracy can only work if your choice in the voting booth is actually informed. I am totally with you on that. But I also believe, that I am able to inform me "just in time". When I read about the least years, read the party programs, read the proposals and the essayists discussing them. I do this in the weeks leading up to an election. And - we are imho lucky to have this in Germany - am able to use an online tool to check all party programs against the things important to me in a kind of "who fits best" tool. This is done by an independent organisation and is nowadays kind of an institution by itself.