I currently have two daily sources of news, Reddit and Google News. On Reddit, it's r/worldnews (global), r/politics (US), and r/news (general US). Occasionally I'll look into Ukraine-specific subreddits to catch up on the war.
I don't think there is a massive benefit to skimming the news. I think the primary benefit is that I might see a topic that interests me and I can do a deep-dive on that and learn way more than I otherwise would. Recently, I've done "research" into Iran, the Yemen civil war, the history of taxes in the US, what kind of soil is under Florida and how continued climate change might affect it, flood insurance in the US, the history of Ukraine, Zelenskyy's politics and public support before the war, Merkel's politics towards Russia, Samsung's most popular phones in different parts of the world, chip manufacturing and node sizes, everything about the Surfside condo collapse, etc.
News is mostly clickbait and you won't learn much other than "this thing happened". What interests me most is "why did thing happen" or "what are the consequences" or "who does this affect and how", and that's when I really start to learn. Also interesting is to look into who supports what position and why.
The biggest danger, imo, is becoming jaded or depressed by reading too much negative news. That's when I know I need to take a temporary break from the daily news cycle.
Yep I went through a phase in my early/mid 20s where I was still in information sponge mode and started applying this to world news, as if somehow by absorbing 100% of world news all the time, I'd be a "more informed citizen" and all the benefits of that.
Now I will casually glance at google news once or twice a day, and my extended friends group has a chat thread where interesting/enraging/amusing headlines get posted with no expectation that it will spur conversation. I probably spend 30-45 min a day reading various articles between the two sources. That feels like the right amount of time to spend on current events. I will however fall down a "wikipedia hole" for an hour or more pretty regularly trying to understand the historical context of a situation.
Me and my close buddies periodically (roughly once a year?) go through a phase where we individually swear off reading the news for a couple of weeks. It is refreshing.
For the mid-terms cycle I don't think I followed any of the races at all, beyond checking fivethirtyeight to see who the projected winners would be, and then a follow up after.
> I currently have two daily sources of news, Reddit and Google News.
> News is mostly clickbait
I don't want to tell you how to do you, but just know that there are plenty of informative journalistic sources that do not reduce their headlines to clickbait - if you are willing to pay a bit for your news.
I know. There are some great news articles out there, but those are things I find when I do my deep-dive. And I'd say despite these sources, the vast majority of news out there is still clickbait. I prefer not to be bound to a single or handful of sources, because of how easy it is to get stuck in bubbles.
I don't think there is a massive benefit to skimming the news. I think the primary benefit is that I might see a topic that interests me and I can do a deep-dive on that and learn way more than I otherwise would. Recently, I've done "research" into Iran, the Yemen civil war, the history of taxes in the US, what kind of soil is under Florida and how continued climate change might affect it, flood insurance in the US, the history of Ukraine, Zelenskyy's politics and public support before the war, Merkel's politics towards Russia, Samsung's most popular phones in different parts of the world, chip manufacturing and node sizes, everything about the Surfside condo collapse, etc.
News is mostly clickbait and you won't learn much other than "this thing happened". What interests me most is "why did thing happen" or "what are the consequences" or "who does this affect and how", and that's when I really start to learn. Also interesting is to look into who supports what position and why.
The biggest danger, imo, is becoming jaded or depressed by reading too much negative news. That's when I know I need to take a temporary break from the daily news cycle.