10 ms·

The power of ignoring mainstream news

111 points by endtwist 14y ago

5partan 14y ago
Facebook and Twitter is mainstream on its own.
woodchuck64 14y ago
I'm down to a few minutes of Google News per day, but that's hard to break.
brador 14y ago
I've come across this while building the feed list for http://skimfeed.com http://skimfeed.com. To keep signal to noise as high as possible, I've had to remove all regular news sources from the site (CNN, MSNBC...). They're time wasting, regurgitated junk adding little to no value to readers lives. At the same time, I think ignoring mainstream news completely is not the solution, it's nice to know what the masses are consuming and it keeps you up on trends. Conclusion? everything in moderation.
tbeseda 14y ago
I understand a healthy media diet but as an able/concerned/voting citizen, I cannot justify abstaining from news* entirely. *News being defined as important information about important events. (Not TMZ, GMA, opinion columns/shows, etc.)
- swombat 14y ago
  Do you think news is the best channel to make an informed voting choice? It could be argued either way, but it's certainly not clear. In Switzerland, the best source of info is usually the documentation that comes with the voting papers. News is just noise and opinion.
  - andrewcooke 14y ago
    who said it was "best"? surely a variety of sources would be better than any one. and excluding news from those seems like a significant omission; particularly when the justification seems to be "bad news is nasty and makes me feel bad" (the other argument seems to be that you can do better things with your time, but i would have thought 15min scanning the BBC, say, while having your breakfast would be a pretty good way to manage time).
  - tbeseda 14y ago
    We have decent documentation provided here, too (at least in CO). I'm unsure if it's ample enough to make a completely informed decision. Some issues demand more cultural/social context, "the full story" as it were. I think this context is probably best created by discourse and debate, but can also be augmented with news. Of course, this leads to another media/news issue in the Internet Age: consumption bias -- only reading/watching media you agree with. I try to maintain moderation and balance.
- graeme 14y ago
  You still hear about important events. I haven't bought a newspaper in years, but I can keep up with my family in political discussions. If something is important, people mention it.
  - tbeseda 14y ago
    Until everyone stops consuming news.
    - goldfeld 14y ago
      Until humans lose their human nature, you mean? The masses have always been pretty content with their panis et circensis, and I don't see everyone enlightened with a drive to fulfill their self-assigned purpose on Earth through doing work they truly love anytime in the foreseeable future. God, what would the big corporations do then?
    - kstenerud 14y ago
      Which doesn't happen.
goldfeld 14y ago
I think news and several other activites can be grouped under the "will this have made any impact in my life within 5 years?" good procrastination umbrella.
fecklessyouth 14y ago
I've stopped going Reddit, for a similar effect.
- v0cab 14y ago
  I keep Redditing, but unsubscribe from most of the default subreddits, and subscribe to TrueReddit, TrueAtheism, and whatever else holds my interest.
  - spindritf 14y ago
    That way you put yourself in a bubble, I found reddit to be much more interesting when I installed RES http://redditenhancementsuite.com/ http://redditenhancementsuite.com/ and used the filter to hide all the crappy or uninteresting subreddits and browse r/all. Some new, small communities are absolutely spectacular, see http://www.reddit.com/r/standupshots http://www.reddit.com/r/standupshots for example.
  - agumonkey 14y ago
    I pruned my subscription lists too, and now it's as if it's frozen. Beside those 2 you mentioned what else is time worthy ?
    - v0cab 14y ago
      Well, what are your interests?
      - agumonkey 14y ago
        let's not try to fit my bubble, throw me anything
        v0cab 14y ago
        TrueAtheism, DebateReligion, MensRights, TrueGaming, AskScience.
webwanderings 14y ago
Did you stop absorbing news altogether or you just stopped looking at mainstream news? What is your definition of mainstream news? I think it is reasonable to be an observer of your local news - the news which affects your immediate environment - otherwise rest of the long distance news is irrelevant so I am in agreement.
alinajaf 14y ago
My personal, ad-hoc strategy for keeping up with news (aside from HN): * Glance Newspaper headlines on the metro or at newsstands. * Every quarter or so, pick up a copies of The Economist and New Scientist. * Hit wikipedia for an intro to issues/subjects that I find interesting. * Track down books/papers on anything that I want to delve deeper into.
zerostar07 14y ago
I recently had the opposite revelation: Most social sites are too much of a distraction, feeding us with pointless weakly-written opinions and things that have zero effect in my life. Their signal to noise ratio is definitely lower, and is not compensated by the higher amount of info they pile up. Humans are by nature curious about what's happening, and no matter how much one bulks up at the local gym, they are probably not quenching their thirst in that way.
- diego 14y ago
  And you're posting this to a social site :)
  - zerostar07 14y ago
    Don't get me wrong, HN is my go-to source for interesting stuff to read. But it turns out the best ones link to "mainstream news sites".
- w1ntermute 14y ago
  > I recently had the opposite revelation: Most social sites are too much of a distraction, feeding us with pointless weakly-written opinions and things that have zero effect in my life. I don't think TFA is suggesting that you replace mainstream news with social news - just that you should cut mainstream news out of your information diet. > Humans are by nature curious about what's happening, and no matter how much one bulks up at the local gym, they are probably not quenching their thirst in that way. Humans are "by nature" a lot of things, many of which we've come to fight quite successfully. There's no reason why this would be any different.
- huggah 14y ago
  You're presenting a false dichotomy: Joel never said "switch to social sites"; in fact, he suggested we all go out and do things. If you feel like you need to "quench your thirst" for current news, maybe traditional outlets work better for you than social media. Personally, I agree with Joel; most of us in the modern world are gluttons for information, and consume more than we even want, let alone what we need. Yes, I realize the irony of posting this to a social news site.
MattGrommes 14y ago
I stopped following the TV news years ago and almost never browse news websites. I use my social feeds (Twitter, HN, Facebook) and the Reddit frontpage as a high-pass filter for what news events I might care about digging more into. This cuts out almost all "X is bad for you!" scaremongering and celebrity nonsense (which I have almost a separate filter for mentally). When something like the recent anti-Islam movie fiasco happens I hear about it and dig in more. It's very freeing not to have to hear distorted stories about how everything's going to hell. Right now the local mayoral election has made me pay more attention to the local news and I almost always regret that additional noise, even though the local organization I use (The Voice of San Diego) is about as good at journalism as I've seen.
ahquresh 14y ago
I feel the same way about the information that we are bombarded with on a daily basis. He is right, in the sense that much of it is very negative, though I also feel some of it is information that everyone should know. With that in mind, I would like to know where everyone goes for their information. It seems that alot of the information and news that everyone should know, be it positive or negative, is very difficult to find. This raises the question, how do we get this information into the mainstream media? The biggest problem for me is the lack of control, users have over the information that they are presented with. Even Google is able to show us the content they want us to see, or think we want to see. I think that this control is really destroying our ability to change as personalities in the online and offline world.
tete 14y ago
There is one really big problem with social news: Filter Bubbles. http://dontbubble.us/ http://dontbubble.us/
Wilya 14y ago
The more mainstream news is, the easier it will reach you, whatever you do, whether you spend time looking for it or not. That's kind of obvious, in hindsight, that's why it's called mainstream. Consequently, watching and reading news is useless, since you will always find someone eager to talk to you about the important stuff, and you can always double check the facts afterwards. Reading already curated sources of info, preferably quite a few of them, coming from varied backgrounds, and doing a more focused research afterwards if it seems worth it, beats mainstream news most of the time. And by curated, I mean low volume sources. My rule of thumb is that if an rss feed (which is where most of my news comes from) gets more than four or five updates a week, it's probably not worth it (or I subscribed to it because it's a type of noise that I like, but it's still noise).
pixelmonkey 14y ago
Here is the kernel of good advice in this post: consuming news can be addicting, can create a negative worldview, and might not provide the informational content you think it may. However, the author then makes a series of suggestions for all the things you should be doing with your time, such as: (a) playing videogames; (b) mentoring other startup founders; (c) building your own startup; (d) writing on your blog; (e) going to the gym. All of these suggestions for what you should be doing with your time are... surprise, surprise... things that the author does with his time, instead of reading the news. The reflection I got out of this post was perhaps the opposite of intended: I need to stop reading HN!
- aggronn 14y ago
  This makes me wonder: which is more valuable? writing blog posts or reading actual news?
  - bpatrianakos 14y ago
    Depends on the goal. The answer is neither and both.
howcan 14y ago
I do not mean to disagree with the OP, but here's a thought: What would happen if we required someone like Warren Buffet to ignore the news? What if he was prohibited from reading a single newspaper? What would happen? I know many people who read multiple newspapers every day, without fail. If they were not allowed access to the news, I think their ability to function in their chosen profession would be severely impacted.
- splat 14y ago
  > What would happen if we required someone like Warren Buffet to ignore the news? I think that's missing the point a bit. The OP was pointing out that there is an opportunity cost of consuming the news. For the OP, the return on his time investment was not worth it. But for someone like Warren Buffet, it obviously would be.
  - howcan 14y ago
    No, I think I understand the OP. That's why I said "I do not mean to disagree..." Did you catch that part? I'm simply pointing out that for some people the news is very valuable to what they do. As you say, for the OP it might not have as much value. It depends on what you're trying to do. I think a more interesting title would be: "The power of being able to think for yourself". For example, it's possible to be able to read the news, when it is overwhelmingly negative or even low quality news (e.g. it doesn't tell you anything you don't already know), and still derive something positive from it. And there are many examples that prove this: businesspeople who read heaps of news and still manage to accomplish quite a lot, at least in the opinion of their peers. You may stop reading the news. But most everyone else is still reading it. And to the extent your business is concerned with some segment of that group I refer to as "everyone else", the news is a factor to consider. Hope that's a little more clear. pg's essay on PR as it relates to startups is a decent intro into how the news can be important for hackers.
- k_kelly 14y ago
  There are by and large two types of stories in newspapers. Stories that appeal to emotion and stories that relate to data. From my experience in newsrooms, stories that are primarily emotional are dealt with by Journalists nearly exclusively, they require strong story telling and usually invasive interviewing and exposure. Stories from data tend to be collected by outside interests and presented to newspapers. Journalists can then spin stories from the data, or if they are writing for a financial publication typically highlight the most salient points for consumption. Occasionally, and far more infrequently than in the past, the media institution will collect a survey themselves or crunch the numbers, and this is almost always pseudo-scientific. Ultimately journalists rarely improve this data other than to make it more gossip worthy. There is a huge amount of data presented every day, from pr firms, from foundations and from public bodies, and all of it wants to be read. Warren Buffet might prefer to read it in the New York Times, but with a strong and deep twitter feed almost anyone can now be as informed as the average news room (there are exceptions to this, on the other hand, reading those same newspapers cover to cover is also a good way to fill your head with soporific twaddle) While I don't agree with the original article, as I think many publications offer some well reasoned analysis and challenging opinions, social media is more than enough to stay as well informed as anyone, though it remains more difficult to navigate. On the other hand, imagine if Warren Buffet were only allowed to get his information from cable news. That would be frightening.
tzs 14y ago
I found that when I let mainstream news go and tried to stay informed via social media, blogs, and Reddit, I felt informed. Then I got a Kindle and tried a mainstream newspaper subscription. I quickly noticed that the newspaper often disagreed with what I'd "learn" from Reddit and blogs, and upon further investigation the newspaper was almost always correct. Apparently the Reddit circle jerk is not as good at news as professional journalists.
- intellegacy 14y ago
  Examples?
  - polshaw 14y ago
    1. Go to reddit.com/r/science 2. Pick an article 3. Go to comments to find out why the outlandish claim is wrong Similarly politics, news; although a lot of that is selection.
- batgaijin 14y ago
  Eh, as much as I want to agree with you (and I do, reddit is a cesspool at times) you still can't argue with this: http://query.nytimes.com/search/sitesearch/#/trapwire/since1851/articles/ http://query.nytimes.com/search/sitesearch/#/trapwire/since1... and this: http://query.nytimes.com/search/sitesearch/#/flame http://query.nytimes.com/search/sitesearch/#/flame Trapwire: funded by rich people who don't want to get noticed Flame: software showing off the usa's capability for cryptovirology and basically saying our most public stuff beats your best secret shit
  - tptacek 14y ago
    You can't argue with that because that isn't an argument. Most companies are funded by rich people. Who knows whether Trapwire "wants to get noticed"? They sell to giant organizations, not to the public. Most of what you know about Trapwire probably comes via Stratfor thirdhand via Wikileaks by way of Reddit. Think about that again: your information started at Stratfor. It was then spun by Wikileaks. And then it was analyzed by Reddit. And you trust it more than the NYT. And all the while, Trapwire had a web page describing all this stuff. One reason why the NYT and WaPo and WSJ and Al Jazeera are so much better than Reddit at conveying the news is that they have something to lose when they get the story wrong. All of them trade on reputations that took decades to build. You can literally feel this in action as you race to start typing about how the NYT got Iraq wrong. Notice how you can't say that about any story on Reddit, because it's a howling mob of random people? (FWIW: There are great comments on Reddit; their highs are higher than HN's highs, by a lot.)
propercoil 14y ago
I feel like i wrote this article! i stopped watching news/ propaganda/pr for a year and a half and i can't believe i wasted my time back then!
- personlurking 14y ago
  Ditto, but I did it back around 2008. Most of the articles I read are less on current events than they are on subjects that lean towards timeless ideas, concepts and theories. Plus I already have tons of interests (mostly humanities) and that keeps my plate full. Recently, I also started 'printing as PDF' any articles I want to read later and putting them in a folder on my desktop. Being aware of what constitutes propaganda/pr allows me to watch some mainstream films and TV shows while not being as brain-washed as someone who watched them 'to relax'/unfiltered. Being a person who likes to think and analyze, I can relax/rest when I sleep.
agumonkey 14y ago
Good news come from being close to the source while having means of integrating the knowledge. For programming topics I found irc channels and conferences are hard to beat. Unless you work in interesting companies.
kiba 14y ago
One of the problem that the OP blog points out is that mainstream news dish out bad news that encourage an exaggerated and wraped fearful worldview. For example, when a mass murder incident happens, people talk a lot about gun violence and how it's gripping the country and we should do something about it. Of course, they forgot that 40K people die in car accidents, 600K more die of heart disease and about 500K more die of cancer each year. A mass murderer is essentially an amateur when they are compared to inanimate or impersonal killers like cells going out of control or high blood pressure. People aren't going to stop talking about these incidents and they aren't going to stop being terribly uninformed with just this blog post. What they need is some sort of media campaign to inform them of the real risk of dying and what they really need to fear. This is what I called "fear inoculation", a term I coined at http://kibabase.com/articles/notes-and-thoughts#fear-inoculation http://kibabase.com/articles/notes-and-thoughts#fear-inocula... In essence, fear inoculation is basically protection against memes that promote irrational fear of certain things like terrorist incidents and airplane crash.
- jberryman 14y ago
  You are aware that gun deaths are on course to exceed auto deaths this year? While the gov. has spent billions over decades to prevent auto deaths, cancer deaths, etc., effectively $0 have been spent to study and prevent gun deaths; how is it irrational to be concerned about that?
  - kvnn 14y ago
    This is actually very surprising to me. Thanks for the info.
  - kiba 14y ago
    Gun death looks like a proximate cause. Guns are tools for suicide, or for killing people who you don't like. If you want to reduce gun related death, you should look into suicide research and criminology/sociology research. You could ban guns, but it's likely that people will kill each other with something else. There's no shortage of methods on way to kill somebody. Anyway, do you have a citation? I have mine, which is http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/deaths.htm http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/deaths.htm
motters 14y ago
It's not only a problem of negativity though. It's also about churnalism, which compromises the integrity of a lot of mainstream news.
larrys 14y ago
"Not only is watching news going to put an out of proportion amount of negative thoughts in your mind, which will affect what you can achieve, it is also valuable time where there are many amazing and meaningful things you could be doing" Well let's add to this then. What about time wasted sitting in synagogue or church saying the same prayers over and over again? To me that's even a bigger waste of time. What if people got together and actually learned something during that time (if together) or on their own. To me at least the sermons were always interesting (ymmv of course) but they were mainly filed under "entertainment" value. That said there is a value to main stream news depending on what your business or product is. It is important to have the beat on what others are watching and thinking to me it does have value. Some people say "who cares what the WSJ or NYT thinks"? But the truth is others care and carry that info out to people and it's a good idea to know what others are going to believe and think. That doesn't mean that you have to watch mainstream everyday, but I wouldn't go as far as saying the right approach is to stop watching TV totally as Joel says he has done. Or reading mainstream news.
nacker 14y ago
There was a time when I should have felt terribly ashamed of not being up-to-date. I lived in a chronic apprehension lest I might, so to speak, miss the last bus, and so find myself stranded and benighted, in a desert of demodedness, while others, more nimble than myself, had already climbed on board, taken their tickets and set out toward those bright but, alas, ever receding goals of Modernity and Sophistication. Now, however, I have grown shameless, I have lost my fears. I can watch unmoved the departure of the last social-cultural bus—the innumerable last buses, which are starting at every instant in all the world’s capitals. I make no effort to board them, and when the noise of each departure has died down, “Thank goodness!” is what I say to myself in the solitude. I find nowadays that I simply don’t want to be up-to-date. I have lost all desire to see and do the things, the seeing and doing of which entitle a man to regard himself as superiorly knowing, sophisticated, unprovincial; I have lost all desire to frequent the places and people that a man simply must frequent, if he is not to be regarded as a poor creature hopelessly out of the swim. “Be up-to-date!” is the categorical imperative of those who scramble for the last bus. But it is an imperative whose cogency I refuse to admit. When it is a question of doing something which I regard as a duty I am as ready as anyone else to put up with discomfort. But being up-to-date and in the swim has ceased, so far as I am concerned, to be a duty. Why should I have my feelings outraged, why should I submit to being bored and disgusted for the sake of somebody else’s categorical imperative? Why? There is no reason. So I simply avoid most of the manifestations of that so-called “life” which my contemporaries seem to be so unaccountably anxious to “see”; I keep out of range of the “art” they think is so vitally necessary to “keep up with”; I flee from those “good times” in the “having” of which they are prepared to spend so lavishly of their energy and cash. From "Silence is Golden" by Aldous Huxley
bpatrianakos 14y ago
This is terrible advice and not something I think people should be recommending to others. I love Joel's posts enough to subscribe to the rss feed (which I have never done for any site ever) but this post is something I strongly disagree with for many good reasons. The idea he puts forth is incredibly naive and has not been taken to its natural conclusion. He talks about the negative side of keeping up with the news while ignoring the many positives. He puts forth a simple solution to a complex problem. The solution he comes up with is naive and extreme. The problem seems to be that news being biased and overwhelmingly negative puts a damper on your mood. It can also harm productivity when becoming too engrossed in it and when the news stirs up strong emotions. His point is valid but his solution is extreme. I think it's this kind of attitude that is making Americans stupid when it comes to civics. People in this country (the US) have no clue what's going on in the world or domestically because they either don't follow the news at all or because all they can process at any given moment is some asinine sound bite that barely comes close to touching on the substance of an issue. Following news isn't harming anyone's mental well being. Not following the news is what causes harm. We pay a price for ignorance and the bill is about due. Following the news keeps you informed, it expands your world beyond the narrow little bubble most people live in, and it makes you an informed citizen which then gives you the tools to make smart decisions and, if you're an entrepreneur especially, gives you insight into where your next opportunity may come from. While Joel's points about the detrimental effect the news can have and the problems with the media itself are pretty valid, tuning out is the wrong solution. The real solution is to be aware that what you see and hear is often biased. Being aware of the business side of the news will make you a better, more informed consumer of news thus making any news you consume more valuable and often actionable. Now, if watching the news and reading mainstream news outlets creates anxiety for you then you probably have to brush up on your skills as a consumer of news. You don't need to watch 8hours of CNN or read the newspaper cover to cover to be informed. Consuming mainstream news reasonably shouldnt be detrimental in any way to you. Furthermore, the fact that he singles out "mainstream" news makes me worry. It implies that news sources outside of the mainstream are somehow better or more true. This is not the case. Many of these news sources outside the mainstream like the brag about how they are the only ones with the balls to report the "truth". Whenever anyone appoints themselves the authority on truth it's time to be skeptical. Everyone has an agenda and while mainstream news may have some major problems with bias and conflicts of interest, it doesn't mean they are completely without any credibility news outside the mainstream can be just as bad if not worse than mainstream news. These organizations often push a very biased agenda or peddle ridiculous conspiracy theories while claiming to be sources of truth. Many times both the conspiracy theories and extreme bias go together in a news outlet beyond the mainstream in an effort to push some agenda. I used to be a believer in "truth" and conspiracy theories (often being unable to tell the difference). Now I understand that truth is not always so clear cut. There are degrees of truth. The best thing to do is not to ignore mainstream news but embrace it. Embrace it with a healthy amount of skepticism and logic. It will expose you to new ideas and keep you up on what's going on in the world. So long as you consume it smartly you won't have a problem. This whole post seems to be born out of a non-problem. I mean it's a problem but a problem born out of going to extremes. I happen to be keeping up with the news and in particular the US presidential election. It sometimes makes me angry but not to the point of disrupting my life in any way at all. It doesn't keep me from being productive. I listen to the radio as I drive to the train and sometimes read a paper on the train itself. Thoughts of the news don't distract me at work or socially. And when I see or hear nonsense I can tell its nonsense and go on with my day. This post is a recipe for ignorance. If you plan to live a monastic life or a certain lifestyle that allows you to get away with being uninformed then this is good advice. But for the vast majority of us living modern lives trying to get by in this world, it's a shortcut to happiness that has a price.
donretag 14y ago
A year or two ago I read Tim Ferriss' The 4-Hour Work Week. Most of the advice in the book did not pertain to me, but one tidbit of knowledge that I gain is that you can save time by simply ignoring the news. Most of us are not in the position to change anything, and much of the news does not pertain directly to us. The benefit from being informed often not great than the cost of losing the time needed to read/watch the news. I tried to find some quotes from the book, but the best I could find was only this article: http://www.evomend.net/en/tim-ferriss-4-hour-workweek-3-5-less-more-elimination http://www.evomend.net/en/tim-ferriss-4-hour-workweek-3-5-le...
OoTheNigerian 14y ago
I agree with Joel here. He echos a similar post written a while back that asks an interesting question. If you did not know Barack Obama was the president of the United States, would your life be affected? For me, the answer is no. You?
FuzzyDunlop 14y ago
I agree with this, because it's something I've done for a while, but for different reasons (primarily to do with mental health). But as an addendum to that it's also important to know and accept that, as a result, you are more ignorant. This isn't a bad thing, for as long as you know that you're willingly less informed. As stated, this is the opportunity cost for pursuing things more important to you. As an aside, I'd like to recommend Flat Earth News[0] to anyone who wants a journalist's insight into how the news isn't always truthful. As another one, I saw a comment saying Americans are how they are because they don't watch the news. I disagree. Watching the news does not make you culturally sensitive. [0] http://www.amazon.co.uk/Flat-Earth-News-Award-winning-Distortion/dp/0701181451 http://www.amazon.co.uk/Flat-Earth-News-Award-winning-Distor...
xradionut 14y ago
As I get older, I've grown to understand that you can't ignore news and media completely, you just need to filter it to the point that you can make it useful for your needs. Like any other media, 99.99 percent of news is crap. Between smart phone apps and RSS feeds I can limit my "daily consumption" to what I want and need with a modest amount of ads and fluff taking up my time. But periodically I hit the browser or the library and get caught up on subjects that may require deeper knowledge. The best source of links to a broad spectrum of media I have found is here: http://www.insideautomotive.com/sources.htm http://www.insideautomotive.com/sources.htm
bennesvig 14y ago
"The quicker goes the journalist the slower go his thoughts. The result is the newspaper of our time, which every day can be delivered earlier and earlier, and which, every day, is less worth delivering at all." - GK Chesterton...in the 1920's.
logn 14y ago
I'll just share my news diet and what I think of each of them. I take all news with a grain of salt and try to mix it up. I think it's a mistake to just give up news altogether though. HN: interesting technical pieces occasionally and good coverage of tech industry but is often an echo chamber (granted one I agree with) and features a lot of fluff pieces written by bloggers lacking original thought and research skills WSJ: good coverage of business but features a world-view that's almost completely obsessed with money and right-wing ideology, yet the pieces are still thoughtful and original NYTimes: I occasionally read to find out about world events since they have great breadth and coverage Local papers: generally a crap-hole of AP content and crime reports but is useful for sports and city council/schools coverage Slashdot: for teh lulz. but these people share my outrage at government intrusion in our lives so I like reading up Facebook: I have good friends who link to good stories in publications I would otherwise never read NPR/public radio: insightful and original story ideas, but they're very much into intellectual naval gazing AM conservative radio: they're entertaining, and I enjoy hearing their take on recent events which often have a lot of valid points. at least they wear their bias on their sleeves even if it gets in the way of legitimate reporting/analysis Local TV news: completely pointless and depressing recap of local crime and fluff pieces. useful in the event of local severe weather. decent sports interviews but mostly resorts to flimsy soundbites Daily Show: you can always count on Jon to call people out on their BS and point out absurdities Google News: extremely useful for getting up to speed on what's happening but is often trapped in a monotonous cycle of iPhone news, 'radical' health discoveries which are overblown, violence in foreign countries, and gaffe-centric political reporting Twitter: I follow over a 1000 people so it's like sifting through a pile of periodicals in the bathroom which sometimes turns up some good finds but is mostly just perfume ads
pinaceae 14y ago
'ignorance is bliss'. go ahead, tune out the news. please stop voting though, democracy relies on the informed voter. and good luck in the capitalist economy, that one relies on information as well. as this is hn, let's focus on the founder's perspective. if you have no clue about what's going on in the world, how can you compete within it? if you have no clue about your target group's current situation? pick anything, like healthcare - great opportunities, but good luck not staying informed. back to the general reason why this terrible advice: being ignorant makes you a terrible citizen. it is already bad in the US, if you're only watching tv news you're already clueless about the world. whenever i am in the us i am amazed about the lack of true world news - CNN International is a very different channel than CNN. as a voter it is your frickin responsibility to stay informed. your worldview baffles me.
- enoch_r 14y ago
  He stopped reading "mainstream news," not all news. Whether you solely read newspapers or Hacker News, you're getting an insignificant and unrepresentative sample of "what's going on in the world." Personally, I think that building one's own sampling technique (for example, by reading a variety of blogs or sites like this) can deliver a much more accurate picture of the world than your average newspaper.
- stripe 14y ago
  "democracy relies on the informed voter" yeah, get informed by mainstream media - totally does wonders to democracy. did work hefty fine in itally where the former head of state owned a large slice of tv/newspaper. by coincidence he was voted on and on and on. same for some african countries. democracy export country no1 - USA - has just exchanged the single person who controls the media with a network of controllers. so dumb voters will not notice that they are manipulated. "they said it twice on different tv channels, so it must be true". don't know if the US got that from the Germans or the other way around cause they got the same system. And even that system could be applied to HN, too. Just have 10 friends submit, upvote and comment on the latest and greatest technology/company. Readers that just get themselves informed through HN must think that gazillions of people now love and use this technology. Long story short: Do not just consume news. Always ask why you should believe what you just read and who will benefit from you believing that. Now knowing that, ask yourself: What is your benefit from that news again?
goggles99 14y ago
News is sensationalized, augmented, agendized, skewed, propaganda, entertainmentized garbage. Could not agree with the author more. Only pay attention to "the news" if you spend the necessary time online researching and finding out each real/complete story (facts and both sides of the story). Otherwise how can you not help being persuaded and shaped by the mainstream media?
Roelven 14y ago
I strongly agree. I became happier once I stopped following whatever mainstream news channels. I consume new things via social circles (no G+ pun intended), meaning there's a sifter of curators picking stuff for me. I'm aware of the fact that this can put you in some sort of tunnelvision, but you can prevent that by sticking your head out now and then to sniff something new.
dromidas 14y ago
The last time I saw any mainstream news that wasn't part of a youtube joke clip or actually important enough to make it to news sites like slashdot was... well... I think this one time in 5th grade around 1991 I was forced to read a news article of my choice to write an essay about. I don't remember what it was about or anything though these days. So yeah, last time I saw a paper was 1991. Last time I saw a news TV thing was probably mid 90s as well, but I don't remember it since I have literally never seen a full news hour or however long it goes.

111 points by endtwist 14y ago

5partan 14y ago

Facebook and Twitter is mainstream on its own.

woodchuck64 14y ago

I'm down to a few minutes of Google News per day, but that's hard to break.

brador 14y ago

I've come across this while building the feed list for http://skimfeed.com http://skimfeed.com. To keep signal to noise as high as possible, I've had to remove all regular news sources from the site (CNN, MSNBC...). They're time wasting, regurgitated junk adding little to no value to readers lives. At the same time, I think ignoring mainstream news completely is not the solution, it's nice to know what the masses are consuming and it keeps you up on trends. Conclusion? everything in moderation.

tbeseda 14y ago

I understand a healthy media diet but as an able/concerned/voting citizen, I cannot justify abstaining from news* entirely. *News being defined as important information about important events. (Not TMZ, GMA, opinion columns/shows, etc.)

swombat 14y ago
Do you think news is the best channel to make an informed voting choice? It could be argued either way, but it's certainly not clear. In Switzerland, the best source of info is usually the documentation that comes with the voting papers. News is just noise and opinion.
- andrewcooke 14y ago
  who said it was "best"? surely a variety of sources would be better than any one. and excluding news from those seems like a significant omission; particularly when the justification seems to be "bad news is nasty and makes me feel bad" (the other argument seems to be that you can do better things with your time, but i would have thought 15min scanning the BBC, say, while having your breakfast would be a pretty good way to manage time).
- tbeseda 14y ago
  We have decent documentation provided here, too (at least in CO). I'm unsure if it's ample enough to make a completely informed decision. Some issues demand more cultural/social context, "the full story" as it were. I think this context is probably best created by discourse and debate, but can also be augmented with news. Of course, this leads to another media/news issue in the Internet Age: consumption bias -- only reading/watching media you agree with. I try to maintain moderation and balance.
graeme 14y ago
You still hear about important events. I haven't bought a newspaper in years, but I can keep up with my family in political discussions. If something is important, people mention it.
- tbeseda 14y ago
  Until everyone stops consuming news.
  - goldfeld 14y ago
    Until humans lose their human nature, you mean? The masses have always been pretty content with their panis et circensis, and I don't see everyone enlightened with a drive to fulfill their self-assigned purpose on Earth through doing work they truly love anytime in the foreseeable future. God, what would the big corporations do then?
  - kstenerud 14y ago
    Which doesn't happen.

goldfeld 14y ago

I think news and several other activites can be grouped under the "will this have made any impact in my life within 5 years?" good procrastination umbrella.

fecklessyouth 14y ago

I've stopped going Reddit, for a similar effect.

v0cab 14y ago
I keep Redditing, but unsubscribe from most of the default subreddits, and subscribe to TrueReddit, TrueAtheism, and whatever else holds my interest.
- spindritf 14y ago
  That way you put yourself in a bubble, I found reddit to be much more interesting when I installed RES http://redditenhancementsuite.com/ http://redditenhancementsuite.com/ and used the filter to hide all the crappy or uninteresting subreddits and browse r/all. Some new, small communities are absolutely spectacular, see http://www.reddit.com/r/standupshots http://www.reddit.com/r/standupshots for example.
- agumonkey 14y ago
  I pruned my subscription lists too, and now it's as if it's frozen. Beside those 2 you mentioned what else is time worthy ?
  - v0cab 14y ago
    Well, what are your interests?
    - agumonkey 14y ago
      let's not try to fit my bubble, throw me anything
      - v0cab 14y ago
        TrueAtheism, DebateReligion, MensRights, TrueGaming, AskScience.

webwanderings 14y ago

Did you stop absorbing news altogether or you just stopped looking at mainstream news? What is your definition of mainstream news? I think it is reasonable to be an observer of your local news - the news which affects your immediate environment - otherwise rest of the long distance news is irrelevant so I am in agreement.

alinajaf 14y ago

My personal, ad-hoc strategy for keeping up with news (aside from HN): * Glance Newspaper headlines on the metro or at newsstands. * Every quarter or so, pick up a copies of The Economist and New Scientist. * Hit wikipedia for an intro to issues/subjects that I find interesting. * Track down books/papers on anything that I want to delve deeper into.

zerostar07 14y ago

I recently had the opposite revelation: Most social sites are too much of a distraction, feeding us with pointless weakly-written opinions and things that have zero effect in my life. Their signal to noise ratio is definitely lower, and is not compensated by the higher amount of info they pile up. Humans are by nature curious about what's happening, and no matter how much one bulks up at the local gym, they are probably not quenching their thirst in that way.

diego 14y ago
And you're posting this to a social site :)
- zerostar07 14y ago
  Don't get me wrong, HN is my go-to source for interesting stuff to read. But it turns out the best ones link to "mainstream news sites".
w1ntermute 14y ago
> I recently had the opposite revelation: Most social sites are too much of a distraction, feeding us with pointless weakly-written opinions and things that have zero effect in my life. I don't think TFA is suggesting that you replace mainstream news with social news - just that you should cut mainstream news out of your information diet. > Humans are by nature curious about what's happening, and no matter how much one bulks up at the local gym, they are probably not quenching their thirst in that way. Humans are "by nature" a lot of things, many of which we've come to fight quite successfully. There's no reason why this would be any different.
huggah 14y ago
You're presenting a false dichotomy: Joel never said "switch to social sites"; in fact, he suggested we all go out and do things. If you feel like you need to "quench your thirst" for current news, maybe traditional outlets work better for you than social media. Personally, I agree with Joel; most of us in the modern world are gluttons for information, and consume more than we even want, let alone what we need. Yes, I realize the irony of posting this to a social news site.

MattGrommes 14y ago

I stopped following the TV news years ago and almost never browse news websites. I use my social feeds (Twitter, HN, Facebook) and the Reddit frontpage as a high-pass filter for what news events I might care about digging more into. This cuts out almost all "X is bad for you!" scaremongering and celebrity nonsense (which I have almost a separate filter for mentally). When something like the recent anti-Islam movie fiasco happens I hear about it and dig in more. It's very freeing not to have to hear distorted stories about how everything's going to hell. Right now the local mayoral election has made me pay more attention to the local news and I almost always regret that additional noise, even though the local organization I use (The Voice of San Diego) is about as good at journalism as I've seen.

ahquresh 14y ago

I feel the same way about the information that we are bombarded with on a daily basis. He is right, in the sense that much of it is very negative, though I also feel some of it is information that everyone should know. With that in mind, I would like to know where everyone goes for their information. It seems that alot of the information and news that everyone should know, be it positive or negative, is very difficult to find. This raises the question, how do we get this information into the mainstream media? The biggest problem for me is the lack of control, users have over the information that they are presented with. Even Google is able to show us the content they want us to see, or think we want to see. I think that this control is really destroying our ability to change as personalities in the online and offline world.

tete 14y ago

There is one really big problem with social news: Filter Bubbles. http://dontbubble.us/ http://dontbubble.us/

Wilya 14y ago

The more mainstream news is, the easier it will reach you, whatever you do, whether you spend time looking for it or not. That's kind of obvious, in hindsight, that's why it's called mainstream. Consequently, watching and reading news is useless, since you will always find someone eager to talk to you about the important stuff, and you can always double check the facts afterwards. Reading already curated sources of info, preferably quite a few of them, coming from varied backgrounds, and doing a more focused research afterwards if it seems worth it, beats mainstream news most of the time. And by curated, I mean low volume sources. My rule of thumb is that if an rss feed (which is where most of my news comes from) gets more than four or five updates a week, it's probably not worth it (or I subscribed to it because it's a type of noise that I like, but it's still noise).

pixelmonkey 14y ago

Here is the kernel of good advice in this post: consuming news can be addicting, can create a negative worldview, and might not provide the informational content you think it may. However, the author then makes a series of suggestions for all the things you should be doing with your time, such as: (a) playing videogames; (b) mentoring other startup founders; (c) building your own startup; (d) writing on your blog; (e) going to the gym. All of these suggestions for what you should be doing with your time are... surprise, surprise... things that the author does with his time, instead of reading the news. The reflection I got out of this post was perhaps the opposite of intended: I need to stop reading HN!

aggronn 14y ago
This makes me wonder: which is more valuable? writing blog posts or reading actual news?
- bpatrianakos 14y ago
  Depends on the goal. The answer is neither and both.

howcan 14y ago

I do not mean to disagree with the OP, but here's a thought: What would happen if we required someone like Warren Buffet to ignore the news? What if he was prohibited from reading a single newspaper? What would happen? I know many people who read multiple newspapers every day, without fail. If they were not allowed access to the news, I think their ability to function in their chosen profession would be severely impacted.

splat 14y ago
> What would happen if we required someone like Warren Buffet to ignore the news? I think that's missing the point a bit. The OP was pointing out that there is an opportunity cost of consuming the news. For the OP, the return on his time investment was not worth it. But for someone like Warren Buffet, it obviously would be.
- howcan 14y ago
  No, I think I understand the OP. That's why I said "I do not mean to disagree..." Did you catch that part? I'm simply pointing out that for some people the news is very valuable to what they do. As you say, for the OP it might not have as much value. It depends on what you're trying to do. I think a more interesting title would be: "The power of being able to think for yourself". For example, it's possible to be able to read the news, when it is overwhelmingly negative or even low quality news (e.g. it doesn't tell you anything you don't already know), and still derive something positive from it. And there are many examples that prove this: businesspeople who read heaps of news and still manage to accomplish quite a lot, at least in the opinion of their peers. You may stop reading the news. But most everyone else is still reading it. And to the extent your business is concerned with some segment of that group I refer to as "everyone else", the news is a factor to consider. Hope that's a little more clear. pg's essay on PR as it relates to startups is a decent intro into how the news can be important for hackers.
k_kelly 14y ago
There are by and large two types of stories in newspapers. Stories that appeal to emotion and stories that relate to data. From my experience in newsrooms, stories that are primarily emotional are dealt with by Journalists nearly exclusively, they require strong story telling and usually invasive interviewing and exposure. Stories from data tend to be collected by outside interests and presented to newspapers. Journalists can then spin stories from the data, or if they are writing for a financial publication typically highlight the most salient points for consumption. Occasionally, and far more infrequently than in the past, the media institution will collect a survey themselves or crunch the numbers, and this is almost always pseudo-scientific. Ultimately journalists rarely improve this data other than to make it more gossip worthy. There is a huge amount of data presented every day, from pr firms, from foundations and from public bodies, and all of it wants to be read. Warren Buffet might prefer to read it in the New York Times, but with a strong and deep twitter feed almost anyone can now be as informed as the average news room (there are exceptions to this, on the other hand, reading those same newspapers cover to cover is also a good way to fill your head with soporific twaddle) While I don't agree with the original article, as I think many publications offer some well reasoned analysis and challenging opinions, social media is more than enough to stay as well informed as anyone, though it remains more difficult to navigate. On the other hand, imagine if Warren Buffet were only allowed to get his information from cable news. That would be frightening.

tzs 14y ago

I found that when I let mainstream news go and tried to stay informed via social media, blogs, and Reddit, I felt informed. Then I got a Kindle and tried a mainstream newspaper subscription. I quickly noticed that the newspaper often disagreed with what I'd "learn" from Reddit and blogs, and upon further investigation the newspaper was almost always correct. Apparently the Reddit circle jerk is not as good at news as professional journalists.

intellegacy 14y ago
Examples?
- polshaw 14y ago
  1. Go to reddit.com/r/science 2. Pick an article 3. Go to comments to find out why the outlandish claim is wrong Similarly politics, news; although a lot of that is selection.
batgaijin 14y ago
Eh, as much as I want to agree with you (and I do, reddit is a cesspool at times) you still can't argue with this: http://query.nytimes.com/search/sitesearch/#/trapwire/since1851/articles/ http://query.nytimes.com/search/sitesearch/#/trapwire/since1... and this: http://query.nytimes.com/search/sitesearch/#/flame http://query.nytimes.com/search/sitesearch/#/flame Trapwire: funded by rich people who don't want to get noticed Flame: software showing off the usa's capability for cryptovirology and basically saying our most public stuff beats your best secret shit
- tptacek 14y ago
  You can't argue with that because that isn't an argument. Most companies are funded by rich people. Who knows whether Trapwire "wants to get noticed"? They sell to giant organizations, not to the public. Most of what you know about Trapwire probably comes via Stratfor thirdhand via Wikileaks by way of Reddit. Think about that again: your information started at Stratfor. It was then spun by Wikileaks. And then it was analyzed by Reddit. And you trust it more than the NYT. And all the while, Trapwire had a web page describing all this stuff. One reason why the NYT and WaPo and WSJ and Al Jazeera are so much better than Reddit at conveying the news is that they have something to lose when they get the story wrong. All of them trade on reputations that took decades to build. You can literally feel this in action as you race to start typing about how the NYT got Iraq wrong. Notice how you can't say that about any story on Reddit, because it's a howling mob of random people? (FWIW: There are great comments on Reddit; their highs are higher than HN's highs, by a lot.)

propercoil 14y ago

I feel like i wrote this article! i stopped watching news/ propaganda/pr for a year and a half and i can't believe i wasted my time back then!

personlurking 14y ago
Ditto, but I did it back around 2008. Most of the articles I read are less on current events than they are on subjects that lean towards timeless ideas, concepts and theories. Plus I already have tons of interests (mostly humanities) and that keeps my plate full. Recently, I also started 'printing as PDF' any articles I want to read later and putting them in a folder on my desktop. Being aware of what constitutes propaganda/pr allows me to watch some mainstream films and TV shows while not being as brain-washed as someone who watched them 'to relax'/unfiltered. Being a person who likes to think and analyze, I can relax/rest when I sleep.

agumonkey 14y ago

Good news come from being close to the source while having means of integrating the knowledge. For programming topics I found irc channels and conferences are hard to beat. Unless you work in interesting companies.

kiba 14y ago

One of the problem that the OP blog points out is that mainstream news dish out bad news that encourage an exaggerated and wraped fearful worldview. For example, when a mass murder incident happens, people talk a lot about gun violence and how it's gripping the country and we should do something about it. Of course, they forgot that 40K people die in car accidents, 600K more die of heart disease and about 500K more die of cancer each year. A mass murderer is essentially an amateur when they are compared to inanimate or impersonal killers like cells going out of control or high blood pressure. People aren't going to stop talking about these incidents and they aren't going to stop being terribly uninformed with just this blog post. What they need is some sort of media campaign to inform them of the real risk of dying and what they really need to fear. This is what I called "fear inoculation", a term I coined at http://kibabase.com/articles/notes-and-thoughts#fear-inoculation http://kibabase.com/articles/notes-and-thoughts#fear-inocula... In essence, fear inoculation is basically protection against memes that promote irrational fear of certain things like terrorist incidents and airplane crash.

jberryman 14y ago
You are aware that gun deaths are on course to exceed auto deaths this year? While the gov. has spent billions over decades to prevent auto deaths, cancer deaths, etc., effectively $0 have been spent to study and prevent gun deaths; how is it irrational to be concerned about that?
- kvnn 14y ago
  This is actually very surprising to me. Thanks for the info.
- kiba 14y ago
  Gun death looks like a proximate cause. Guns are tools for suicide, or for killing people who you don't like. If you want to reduce gun related death, you should look into suicide research and criminology/sociology research. You could ban guns, but it's likely that people will kill each other with something else. There's no shortage of methods on way to kill somebody. Anyway, do you have a citation? I have mine, which is http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/deaths.htm http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/deaths.htm

motters 14y ago

It's not only a problem of negativity though. It's also about churnalism, which compromises the integrity of a lot of mainstream news.

larrys 14y ago

"Not only is watching news going to put an out of proportion amount of negative thoughts in your mind, which will affect what you can achieve, it is also valuable time where there are many amazing and meaningful things you could be doing" Well let's add to this then. What about time wasted sitting in synagogue or church saying the same prayers over and over again? To me that's even a bigger waste of time. What if people got together and actually learned something during that time (if together) or on their own. To me at least the sermons were always interesting (ymmv of course) but they were mainly filed under "entertainment" value. That said there is a value to main stream news depending on what your business or product is. It is important to have the beat on what others are watching and thinking to me it does have value. Some people say "who cares what the WSJ or NYT thinks"? But the truth is others care and carry that info out to people and it's a good idea to know what others are going to believe and think. That doesn't mean that you have to watch mainstream everyday, but I wouldn't go as far as saying the right approach is to stop watching TV totally as Joel says he has done. Or reading mainstream news.

nacker 14y ago

There was a time when I should have felt terribly ashamed of not being up-to-date. I lived in a chronic apprehension lest I might, so to speak, miss the last bus, and so find myself stranded and benighted, in a desert of demodedness, while others, more nimble than myself, had already climbed on board, taken their tickets and set out toward those bright but, alas, ever receding goals of Modernity and Sophistication. Now, however, I have grown shameless, I have lost my fears. I can watch unmoved the departure of the last social-cultural bus—the innumerable last buses, which are starting at every instant in all the world’s capitals. I make no effort to board them, and when the noise of each departure has died down, “Thank goodness!” is what I say to myself in the solitude. I find nowadays that I simply don’t want to be up-to-date. I have lost all desire to see and do the things, the seeing and doing of which entitle a man to regard himself as superiorly knowing, sophisticated, unprovincial; I have lost all desire to frequent the places and people that a man simply must frequent, if he is not to be regarded as a poor creature hopelessly out of the swim. “Be up-to-date!” is the categorical imperative of those who scramble for the last bus. But it is an imperative whose cogency I refuse to admit. When it is a question of doing something which I regard as a duty I am as ready as anyone else to put up with discomfort. But being up-to-date and in the swim has ceased, so far as I am concerned, to be a duty. Why should I have my feelings outraged, why should I submit to being bored and disgusted for the sake of somebody else’s categorical imperative? Why? There is no reason. So I simply avoid most of the manifestations of that so-called “life” which my contemporaries seem to be so unaccountably anxious to “see”; I keep out of range of the “art” they think is so vitally necessary to “keep up with”; I flee from those “good times” in the “having” of which they are prepared to spend so lavishly of their energy and cash. From "Silence is Golden" by Aldous Huxley

bpatrianakos 14y ago

This is terrible advice and not something I think people should be recommending to others. I love Joel's posts enough to subscribe to the rss feed (which I have never done for any site ever) but this post is something I strongly disagree with for many good reasons. The idea he puts forth is incredibly naive and has not been taken to its natural conclusion. He talks about the negative side of keeping up with the news while ignoring the many positives. He puts forth a simple solution to a complex problem. The solution he comes up with is naive and extreme. The problem seems to be that news being biased and overwhelmingly negative puts a damper on your mood. It can also harm productivity when becoming too engrossed in it and when the news stirs up strong emotions. His point is valid but his solution is extreme. I think it's this kind of attitude that is making Americans stupid when it comes to civics. People in this country (the US) have no clue what's going on in the world or domestically because they either don't follow the news at all or because all they can process at any given moment is some asinine sound bite that barely comes close to touching on the substance of an issue. Following news isn't harming anyone's mental well being. Not following the news is what causes harm. We pay a price for ignorance and the bill is about due. Following the news keeps you informed, it expands your world beyond the narrow little bubble most people live in, and it makes you an informed citizen which then gives you the tools to make smart decisions and, if you're an entrepreneur especially, gives you insight into where your next opportunity may come from. While Joel's points about the detrimental effect the news can have and the problems with the media itself are pretty valid, tuning out is the wrong solution. The real solution is to be aware that what you see and hear is often biased. Being aware of the business side of the news will make you a better, more informed consumer of news thus making any news you consume more valuable and often actionable. Now, if watching the news and reading mainstream news outlets creates anxiety for you then you probably have to brush up on your skills as a consumer of news. You don't need to watch 8hours of CNN or read the newspaper cover to cover to be informed. Consuming mainstream news reasonably shouldnt be detrimental in any way to you. Furthermore, the fact that he singles out "mainstream" news makes me worry. It implies that news sources outside of the mainstream are somehow better or more true. This is not the case. Many of these news sources outside the mainstream like the brag about how they are the only ones with the balls to report the "truth". Whenever anyone appoints themselves the authority on truth it's time to be skeptical. Everyone has an agenda and while mainstream news may have some major problems with bias and conflicts of interest, it doesn't mean they are completely without any credibility news outside the mainstream can be just as bad if not worse than mainstream news. These organizations often push a very biased agenda or peddle ridiculous conspiracy theories while claiming to be sources of truth. Many times both the conspiracy theories and extreme bias go together in a news outlet beyond the mainstream in an effort to push some agenda. I used to be a believer in "truth" and conspiracy theories (often being unable to tell the difference). Now I understand that truth is not always so clear cut. There are degrees of truth. The best thing to do is not to ignore mainstream news but embrace it. Embrace it with a healthy amount of skepticism and logic. It will expose you to new ideas and keep you up on what's going on in the world. So long as you consume it smartly you won't have a problem. This whole post seems to be born out of a non-problem. I mean it's a problem but a problem born out of going to extremes. I happen to be keeping up with the news and in particular the US presidential election. It sometimes makes me angry but not to the point of disrupting my life in any way at all. It doesn't keep me from being productive. I listen to the radio as I drive to the train and sometimes read a paper on the train itself. Thoughts of the news don't distract me at work or socially. And when I see or hear nonsense I can tell its nonsense and go on with my day. This post is a recipe for ignorance. If you plan to live a monastic life or a certain lifestyle that allows you to get away with being uninformed then this is good advice. But for the vast majority of us living modern lives trying to get by in this world, it's a shortcut to happiness that has a price.

donretag 14y ago

A year or two ago I read Tim Ferriss' The 4-Hour Work Week. Most of the advice in the book did not pertain to me, but one tidbit of knowledge that I gain is that you can save time by simply ignoring the news. Most of us are not in the position to change anything, and much of the news does not pertain directly to us. The benefit from being informed often not great than the cost of losing the time needed to read/watch the news. I tried to find some quotes from the book, but the best I could find was only this article: http://www.evomend.net/en/tim-ferriss-4-hour-workweek-3-5-less-more-elimination http://www.evomend.net/en/tim-ferriss-4-hour-workweek-3-5-le...

OoTheNigerian 14y ago

I agree with Joel here. He echos a similar post written a while back that asks an interesting question. If you did not know Barack Obama was the president of the United States, would your life be affected? For me, the answer is no. You?

FuzzyDunlop 14y ago

I agree with this, because it's something I've done for a while, but for different reasons (primarily to do with mental health). But as an addendum to that it's also important to know and accept that, as a result, you are more ignorant. This isn't a bad thing, for as long as you know that you're willingly less informed. As stated, this is the opportunity cost for pursuing things more important to you. As an aside, I'd like to recommend Flat Earth News[0] to anyone who wants a journalist's insight into how the news isn't always truthful. As another one, I saw a comment saying Americans are how they are because they don't watch the news. I disagree. Watching the news does not make you culturally sensitive. [0] http://www.amazon.co.uk/Flat-Earth-News-Award-winning-Distortion/dp/0701181451 http://www.amazon.co.uk/Flat-Earth-News-Award-winning-Distor...

xradionut 14y ago

As I get older, I've grown to understand that you can't ignore news and media completely, you just need to filter it to the point that you can make it useful for your needs. Like any other media, 99.99 percent of news is crap. Between smart phone apps and RSS feeds I can limit my "daily consumption" to what I want and need with a modest amount of ads and fluff taking up my time. But periodically I hit the browser or the library and get caught up on subjects that may require deeper knowledge. The best source of links to a broad spectrum of media I have found is here: http://www.insideautomotive.com/sources.htm http://www.insideautomotive.com/sources.htm

bennesvig 14y ago

"The quicker goes the journalist the slower go his thoughts. The result is the newspaper of our time, which every day can be delivered earlier and earlier, and which, every day, is less worth delivering at all." - GK Chesterton...in the 1920's.

logn 14y ago

I'll just share my news diet and what I think of each of them. I take all news with a grain of salt and try to mix it up. I think it's a mistake to just give up news altogether though. HN: interesting technical pieces occasionally and good coverage of tech industry but is often an echo chamber (granted one I agree with) and features a lot of fluff pieces written by bloggers lacking original thought and research skills WSJ: good coverage of business but features a world-view that's almost completely obsessed with money and right-wing ideology, yet the pieces are still thoughtful and original NYTimes: I occasionally read to find out about world events since they have great breadth and coverage Local papers: generally a crap-hole of AP content and crime reports but is useful for sports and city council/schools coverage Slashdot: for teh lulz. but these people share my outrage at government intrusion in our lives so I like reading up Facebook: I have good friends who link to good stories in publications I would otherwise never read NPR/public radio: insightful and original story ideas, but they're very much into intellectual naval gazing AM conservative radio: they're entertaining, and I enjoy hearing their take on recent events which often have a lot of valid points. at least they wear their bias on their sleeves even if it gets in the way of legitimate reporting/analysis Local TV news: completely pointless and depressing recap of local crime and fluff pieces. useful in the event of local severe weather. decent sports interviews but mostly resorts to flimsy soundbites Daily Show: you can always count on Jon to call people out on their BS and point out absurdities Google News: extremely useful for getting up to speed on what's happening but is often trapped in a monotonous cycle of iPhone news, 'radical' health discoveries which are overblown, violence in foreign countries, and gaffe-centric political reporting Twitter: I follow over a 1000 people so it's like sifting through a pile of periodicals in the bathroom which sometimes turns up some good finds but is mostly just perfume ads

pinaceae 14y ago

'ignorance is bliss'. go ahead, tune out the news. please stop voting though, democracy relies on the informed voter. and good luck in the capitalist economy, that one relies on information as well. as this is hn, let's focus on the founder's perspective. if you have no clue about what's going on in the world, how can you compete within it? if you have no clue about your target group's current situation? pick anything, like healthcare - great opportunities, but good luck not staying informed. back to the general reason why this terrible advice: being ignorant makes you a terrible citizen. it is already bad in the US, if you're only watching tv news you're already clueless about the world. whenever i am in the us i am amazed about the lack of true world news - CNN International is a very different channel than CNN. as a voter it is your frickin responsibility to stay informed. your worldview baffles me.

enoch_r 14y ago
He stopped reading "mainstream news," not all news. Whether you solely read newspapers or Hacker News, you're getting an insignificant and unrepresentative sample of "what's going on in the world." Personally, I think that building one's own sampling technique (for example, by reading a variety of blogs or sites like this) can deliver a much more accurate picture of the world than your average newspaper.
stripe 14y ago
"democracy relies on the informed voter" yeah, get informed by mainstream media - totally does wonders to democracy. did work hefty fine in itally where the former head of state owned a large slice of tv/newspaper. by coincidence he was voted on and on and on. same for some african countries. democracy export country no1 - USA - has just exchanged the single person who controls the media with a network of controllers. so dumb voters will not notice that they are manipulated. "they said it twice on different tv channels, so it must be true". don't know if the US got that from the Germans or the other way around cause they got the same system. And even that system could be applied to HN, too. Just have 10 friends submit, upvote and comment on the latest and greatest technology/company. Readers that just get themselves informed through HN must think that gazillions of people now love and use this technology. Long story short: Do not just consume news. Always ask why you should believe what you just read and who will benefit from you believing that. Now knowing that, ask yourself: What is your benefit from that news again?

goggles99 14y ago

News is sensationalized, augmented, agendized, skewed, propaganda, entertainmentized garbage. Could not agree with the author more. Only pay attention to "the news" if you spend the necessary time online researching and finding out each real/complete story (facts and both sides of the story). Otherwise how can you not help being persuaded and shaped by the mainstream media?

Roelven 14y ago

I strongly agree. I became happier once I stopped following whatever mainstream news channels. I consume new things via social circles (no G+ pun intended), meaning there's a sifter of curators picking stuff for me. I'm aware of the fact that this can put you in some sort of tunnelvision, but you can prevent that by sticking your head out now and then to sniff something new.

dromidas 14y ago

The last time I saw any mainstream news that wasn't part of a youtube joke clip or actually important enough to make it to news sites like slashdot was... well... I think this one time in 5th grade around 1991 I was forced to read a news article of my choice to write an essay about. I don't remember what it was about or anything though these days. So yeah, last time I saw a paper was 1991. Last time I saw a news TV thing was probably mid 90s as well, but I don't remember it since I have literally never seen a full news hour or however long it goes.