[lordbusiness]

I've been running an experiment for the past several months to outsource relevant news curation.

It's super simple and super passive. Basically I only read news brought to my attention organically; social media, word on the street which I later look up, etc.

Thus far I haven't missed anything of genuine humanity-shaking importance, my emotional state has improved, and I have much more time for reading, hacking, and all other aspects of my life.

It resonates with the "millennials consume news differently" piece submitted elsewhere on HN actually.

[Goronmon]

Doesn't this experiment rely on a certain critical mass of people consuming information in a non-organic fashion?

[lordbusiness]

Not really, though I don't claim this has been a truly scientific study. :-)

Generally, the principle relies on "if it's not important [1], people don't talk about it". In other words, anything someone directly or indirectly mentions to me may be of value, everything else is just soundtrack. [2]

Further, I often find that news that does matter comes to me from the likes of a more considered periodical; I learnt a lot of fact-based detail regarding the Alberta oil sands from National Geographic, and I learn about peace process break downs from twitter users I follow far quicker and with less bias than from mainstream media outlets.

Local news tends to be handled by random people I meet on the street. It's effective so far!

[1] This is an overly burdened word in this context. Darfur is very important, but we rarely hear about it, for example. What I mean in this context is "relevant enough to daily life to stop me in my tracks and get my attention". It's worth highlighting here that a lot of very important news doesn't make it to us via mainstream media because mainstream media selects for sales and / or target audience bias / interests, ergo in that sense, I'm actually NOT hearing about important things by tuning in to traditional mainstream media.

[2] People murdering each other due to orders from invisible people in the sky is going to be a soundtrack to my life thanks to the era I live in. I know this happens. It will continue to happen for my life at least. No, I don't need daily reminders of this universal constant. The way I conduct my life and my advocacy against such acts will not be altered because I don't get those daily reminders.