
Avoid News: Towards a Healthy News Diet (2010) [pdf] - andreev_io
https://www.gwern.net/docs/culture/2010-dobelli.pdf
======
chillacy
> Out of the approximately 10,000 news stories you have read in the last 12
> months, name one that.. allowed you to make a better decision about a
> serious matter affecting your life, your career, your business – compared to
> what you would have known if you hadn’t swallowed that morsel of news.

That's what got me to stop keeping up to date with most news a few years ago
and I've been happier for it.

Being more charitable on why news is important though, news serves as modern
day gossip, and gossip may play a key role in holding human societies
together.

[https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/ne9ae8/gossip-may-have-
pl...](https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/ne9ae8/gossip-may-have-played-a-
role-in-human-survival)

~~~
aklemm
A lot of news stories in the past year have given me definitive direction in
terms of how to spend my time politically. How to vote, which meetings to go
to (redistricting, canvassing, etc.) More generally, I think they’ve all
contributed to my mental models of the world.

~~~
lopmotr
I wouldn't consider those to be matters affecting your life, career or
business. They're really just interacting the news, like a hobby. Without the
news, you wouldn't be interested in those things, and as a bonus, you wouldn't
have the common (ie fairly useless) yet distorted mental models of the world
that it gives people.

I have a more concrete example. Around the year 2000 I finished a computer
science degree and was doing postgraduate in another subject. But it was
getting boring and I decided to quit. My professor asked what I'd do next. I
told him the plan I'd had all along - fall back on my CS degree and get a job
as a programmer. What I didn't know, because I didn't read the news, was that
the dot com crash had just happened and you couldn't get a job as a
programmer. So I didn't, and spent a year or two unemployed.

~~~
netsharc
Doesn't your example show how disadvantaged you were because you didn't keep
up with the news? It surely affected your livelihood.

I guess OP doesn't need the news to figure out political candidates'
positions.. or does s/he, since most political websites are just lies and
empty promises. Choosing between e.g. the pro-environment or pro-coal
candidate will surely have an effect on our lives in 20 years' time. Or one
who wants to deploy a police state and harass all non-whites, or all "hippie
weed smoker" types, etc..

~~~
jeegsy
The fact that the news might be necessary to obtain such info strikes me as a
bug not a feature. We shouldn't need media(tion) between would-be politicians
and citizenry. Perhaps quaint and impractical now, but I wish we still lived
in an era where politicians literally went from town to town and yelled their
pitches directly to citizens in the town square.

~~~
lopmotr
I don't see the harm in just reading what politicians promise. My city
recently had a local election. Each candidate got to write a paragraph about
themselves. I read them all looking for a few key points that I felt were
important, and came up with a shortlist. Then excluded a few because of less
important things until I had enough candidates (6) to vote for. Pretty easy.
No news required. I purposely tried to ignore their advertisements in the
street that were uniformly saying "Vote for me because no reason but look at
my face!"

------
gherkinnn
What stopped me from keeping up with the news was noticing it being off
whenever I knew a lot about the topic in question.

Ranging from glaring errors to subtle phrasing that may be technically
correct, but insinuates something else, to -what I can only presume- spark
outrage and thus increase “engagement”.

I can only assume similar discrepancies across every topic.

~~~
casefields
>”Briefly stated, the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect is as follows. You open the
newspaper to an article on some subject you know well. In Murray's case,
physics. In mine, show business. You read the article and see the journalist
has absolutely no understanding of either the facts or the issues. Often, the
article is so wrong it actually presents the story backward—reversing cause
and effect. I call these the "wet streets cause rain" stories. Paper's full of
them. In any case, you read with exasperation or amusement the multiple errors
in a story, and then turn the page to national or international affairs, and
read as if the rest of the newspaper was somehow more accurate about Palestine
than the baloney you just read. You turn the page, and forget what you know.”

Michael Crichton - Why Speculate:
[http://docdro.id/4wgVecr](http://docdro.id/4wgVecr)

~~~
gherkinnn
Thanks. An excellent companion piece to the OP.

------
mcculley
It's unreasonable for most to go entirely without news. A good compromise is
to get your news edited and curated.

I highly value having subscribed to The Economist for a couple of decades now.
I try to avoid real-time news and read The Economist once a week to get global
news. The weekly tempo reduces the need for the publisher to rush out an
opinion on something that recently happened.

I know The Economist has biases. I think I understand most of these biases and
take them into account.

I wish there were similar options for local news.

~~~
chongli
It’s one thing to read a piece and know the editor’s biases so you can take
them into account. It’s another thing entirely when the biases lead to a story
going unpublished. How do you account for selective reporting?

~~~
gen220
As somebody who plays a similar game with magazines (physical copies of New
Yorker, Wired, Nautilus, and others), I don’t think one can realistically
account for it, regardless of how wide and diverse your news diet is. At some
point enough is enough, and it’s practically up to each of us to draw those
lines for ourselves.

For example, it’s not possible to get local news this way (unless you live in
a HUGE city), because local news is selectively ignored by major publications.
For special interest items (tech, travel, food, cultural things) one can add a
more special interest source (like Wired, or random blogs) to your selection,
but those kinds of sources are usually more difficult to get in physical,
weekly or monthly form; newsletters and podcasts are a godsend here.

You can also overcome the blindspots by occasionally browsing less formal
sources like Reddit and Hn, but even those can be more of a trap than it’s
worth ime, and provide their own very false senses of all-knowledge.

To put it another way, the blind spot shoots both ways. I can’t enumerate all
of the fascinating things I’ve learned reading those magazines that I would
never have encountered any where else. I’m not sure if there’s an optimal
solution here, it might be to each their own. :P

------
PaulKeeble
I think there is a deep dilemma associated with the news today. On the one
hand, it is hard to be informed when the news contains so many lies, much of
what you learnt from it just isn't true. The very consumption of it is
adjusting your mental state and making you anxious and less productive and
those responses maybe to something that isn't even true. But on the other
hand, it is impossible to be informed if you don't read the news.

I know I was a lot more productive when I didn't care about the news and
didn't watch any TV shows. I don't think you are a functioning adult unless
you know the major goings-on of the world. People talk about the news a lot
and it's important for those interactions even if it is little more than
gossip. I think swapping quite a lot of the consumption of the low-quality
news with books and other hobbies is something we ought to all do and spend
news consumption on the higher quality publications as a decent middle ground
between cold turkey and continuous consumption of nonsense.

~~~
notelonmusk
> it is impossible to be informed if you don't read the news

being informed is not as valuable when there's more content out than you could
consume in several lifetimes

what's valuable is how to derive any value from it

just an opinion

~~~
PaulKeeble
I guess my argument is the value derived from the news is to fit in with
everyone else. It gives you a common grounding of the worlds going on, it
isn't going to enable you to solve science or technology problems but it will
help enable relationships. Without it, you lose an important connection to
those around you.

~~~
malvosenior
You could say the same thing about sports or Kim Kardashian, or you could just
not care and focus on things that actually interest you. That seems like an
even more mature choice (hence functional adult).

------
mark_l_watson
That was great, just sent the link to a few friends and my wife.

The article is over eight years old, but in modern times, timeless advice.

News addiction is a very real sickness. Just as I would prefer my friends to
maintain privacy online, I would prefer my friends to not waste their energy
and power by gorging on news. Like the article said, news is to the brain what
sugar is to the body.

------
softwaredoug
I disagree that people aren’t tuning out of news. I talk to people in real
life that keep news at a distance. They don’t want to engage, they know it’s a
black hole anxiety inducing clickbait. It seems a common topic of discussion
is our parents who get get off cable news or being fed up with political
twitter/Facebook and deciding to no longer use social media because of news.

There’s a great article from NY Times about “The America That Isn’t Polarized”
people not sucked into the correct news, just doing their jobs
([https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2019/09/24/upsh...](https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2019/09/24/upshot/many-
americans-not-polarized.amp.html))

~~~
pbourke
Are the people interviewed in that article role models that we should all
aspire to emulate? The takeaway seems to be that those with less education and
more economic stress don’t pay as much attention to politics.

------
RachelF
A good little summary. Unfortunately, the author, Rolf Dobelli stole much of
it verbatim from Taleb, something Taleb does not like:

[https://fooledbyrandomness.com/dobelli.htm](https://fooledbyrandomness.com/dobelli.htm)

~~~
doitLP
In the spirit of the article itself, who cares?

He said Taleb was a friend, maybe he gave permission to copy? And even if not
and he stole it, how is that relevant? It’s a good long form article with a
clear message that is all the more beneficial the more widely it is read.

~~~
prepend
Taleb cares most directly, so that matters.

I also think that plagiarism is a detriment for society as it presents
knowledge grounded on a lie. So it poisons knowledge’s ability to help, I
think.

------
Mountain_Skies
It's frustrating how difficult it can be to escape the news, which is almost
always some political outrage. Almost every remote server I log into has MSNBC
set as the default homepage for the browser. Which means even while at work
I'm treated to political outrage. It only takes a second to close but the
exposure has already been done. And then there are all manner of public spaces
that have some cable news channel babbling on. Same for restaurants. Can't
even escape it at sports bars now that sports channels have become political
operations. Hiking seems to be the best way to escape it.

~~~
dredmorbius
OT: what's the context for remote servers having browsers configured to
specific news sources? This strikes me as bizarre.

~~~
shantly
May mean the MSN homepage. IE, maybe Edge (dunno) could have those set as the
default.

~~~
Mountain_Skies
Yes, that's correct. For most Windows Server boxes, everything is designed to
work in IE and it is guaranteed to exist on the box. MSN is Microsoft's choice
as the default homepage for their browsers and MSN, or at least the page that
is the default homepage, is typically stuffed with articles and photos chosen
to solicit engagement, usually thorough provoking outrage. It has no place in
a business environment. Boxes under my control, which aren't many, get
duckduckgo set as the homepage.

~~~
malvosenior
I also didn’t know why a remote server would have news on it. The worlds of
Linux and Windows server administration are so far apart as to be
unrecognizable to each other.

------
SolaceQuantum
Does anyone suggest how to peruse news that is very specific to demographics?
For example, my parents are green card holders and I'm a first generation
immigrant. I'd like to know ASAP any news about government policy changes
about immigration in my country.

Similarly, I'd like to know ASAP any news about government policy changes
about the treatment of LGBTQIA+ people. Where would I go for that?

Really, I think the 'news diet' thing is for a specific demographic of people
that aren't directly influenced by relatively subtle and potentially not-
widely-disseminated news.

~~~
netsharc
In Germany I've seen a forum for people trying to get their permanent
residencies, someone would post a question and get expert answers, even
quoting the relevant laws. I'd imagine there is a section there for "Stuff
that's new"..

------
thepinkelefant
I long for a dedicated curated positive and good news channel only. There are
so many things happening in the world that help humanity and can be reported
in a positive and healthy manner. Perhaps Alexa or google news can just read
out snippets of “feel good” news only and skip all the sensational,policitcal
or celebrity gossip.

The other main point is that there is no need for urgent breaking news likes
it’s shoved down 24x7 nowadays. Consume your news slowly in time, newspapers
were great, you get a 24 hour period to collect thoughts and read well edited
and concise news only that you can pick and choose over a Nice cup of tea !!!
You don’t need to know what’s happening ASAP most of the time for all other
local emergencies ,weather etc perhaps alerts from local news station apps or
appropriate twitter feeds can help.

~~~
throwawaysea
[https://www.reddit.com/r/UpliftingNews/](https://www.reddit.com/r/UpliftingNews/)

------
narrator
One thing that really demoralized me for reading news is I read some political
books from the early 70s and realized that the themes, politics and
controversies haven't changed since then. It's all the same stuff over and
over again. Nothing ever get's resolved.

The author says the most important thing to happen in politics in the last 40
years is Watergate. You could even go without knowing what that was and do
just fine.

~~~
chrisco255
Sure, because the kind of invasion of privacy and corrupt practices our
intelligence agencies engage in today makes Watergate look like child's play.

------
Merrill
Political news can be amusing if you take it the right way. There is no
practical need to follow political news until the last few weeks before an
election.

Intermittent fasting from political and financial news is a good thing.
Business news and sci/tech news are more positive and stimulating anyway.

~~~
nabla9
You should participate politics, even with small effort, not just watch it.
The biggest misunderstanding of democracy is that it's just voting. It's also
organizing and discussion and lobbying/pressuring.

And following politics only during elections is also wrong advice. It's enough
to follow issues weekly or monthly, not daily. Following politicians is less
important than following the issues.

~~~
Merrill
I think that representative democracy works, while direct democracy has very
mixed track record. Generally the public should not be weighing in on issues.

The problem is that the public doesn't have the attention, interest or
background to address more than a small number of issues. The issues that they
do address are not necessarily important ones, but ones that the editorial
boards of mass media think will attract eyeballs and sell ad space. The
discussion is then led by special interest groups that are funded by
interested parties. The result is a lot of heat among some narrow segment of
the population but not much useful work.

------
deehouie
This is absolutely the best advice I've come across in a long time. In this
day and age where news are used predominantly to manipulate our political
views by the major media, this piece is particularly relevant.

~~~
thundergolfer
> this day and age...

The manufacturing of consent has been going on since the corporate
monopolisation of newspapers in the early 20th century, but arguably news
media has always had an agenda.

Before they were killed off I’m sure the labour class media organisations had
an agenda that was pro-labour class.

You can never really escape agenda driven media you just have to be a
knowledgeable, critical media consumer so you can derive information even from
those with antagonistic agendas.

For example, Chomsky still thinks it’s important to read The New York Times
and check out CNN.

~~~
throwawaysea
Even earlier than that. Check out this article about fake news in the days of
George Washington:
[https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2017/04/10...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2017/04/10/the-
fake-news-that-haunted-george-washington/)

------
carrozo
If you’re worried about missing out on a topic, you can always set a series of
Google Alerts for keyword terms to stay in the loop. You’ll also get a wider
variety of sources and opinions.

------
code_code
Thoreau: "Read not the Times; read the Eternities. Conventionalities are at
length as bad as impurities. Even the facts of science may dust the mind by
their dryness, unless they are effaced each morning, or rather rendered
fertile by the dews of fresh and living truth."

When important truths can be partial truths, then -- as with the posted
article -- we can be bold in their statement.

------
doitLP
I’m reminded of the concept of the “50-year Newspaper”. A imagined newspaper
only published every 50 years and only containing the most important stories
of that span of time.

Almost everything in the news is here today gone tomorrow and as the article
points out, what seems important nearly never is.

In the words of Rob Wiblin, news media today is a dumpster fire.

------
deehouie
His point No. 5, 11, 12 are particularly important to people trading financial
markets. It's such a common occurrence that when bad news hit the wire, market
goes up afterward. The investing proverb says, buy on rumor and sell on news.
That's exactly what this guy is saying.

------
Tomte
There is good news tonight.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabriel_Heatter#%22There's_goo...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabriel_Heatter#%22There's_good_news_tonight!%22)

"Heatter was already well known for trying to find uplifting but absolutely
true stories to feed his commentaries. (He was especially known for a fondness
for stories about heroic dogs.)"

------
thoughtstheseus
Try reading Congressional Research Service reports,they often provide
quality/topical info.

------
prjed
This reminds me of an article written by Aaron Swartz:
[http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/hatethenews](http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/hatethenews)

~~~
knzhou
And yet now there is a link at the bottom telling us to follow the author on
Twitter. That's like swearing off pot for heroin.

------
sol_depzul
Author's a known [1] plagiarist though

[1]
[https://www.fooledbyrandomness.com/dobelli.htm](https://www.fooledbyrandomness.com/dobelli.htm)

------
HNLurker2
How selfish do you have to be not to be informed. You have to be a white rich
industrialized man that is isolated from the rest of the world completely for
his whole liglife

~~~
jeegsy
I dont understand anything about this comment

------
nasir
Now replace the word news with social media and you get a new valid document.

------
softwaredoug
I’m frankly conflicted. Ignoring news seems good for my mental health. But is
it really the news? Or is it the reality? For example when you dig into the
Trump administrations policies or behaviors it’s usually MORE horrifying than
imagined.

What if the house really is in fire and we all just want to be in denial about
it by conveniently ignoring news? We’d rather work on the familiar: our own
wealth and personal fulfillment than face the real problems out there?

I don’t doubt the clickbait attention grabbing monstrosity is real, but what
if the horrifying nature of the reality is more important for for us to know
than our mental health? What if we need to focus on the crises society faces
rather than our own personal needs?

------
dominotw
This is an arrogant privileged position to just ignore what is going on around
you. This is at best ignoring the trampling of rights of the weakest of our
society and at worst being an active colluder in such acts.

~~~
sachdevap
Is it really? 99.9% of the people who read the news do nothing to use that in
any way to fight for the weakest in our society. For most, news is nothing but
a list of topics for small talk. A few work towards using it to understand
topics and make informed decisions. Even fewer actually act on anything they
hear in the news directly.

~~~
dominotw
> 99.9% of the people who read the news do nothing to use that in any way

Wouldn't that imply that we don't live in a democracy and ppl are picking
boxes at random at the ballot box?

~~~
shantly
1) I don't need to keep up with the news at all ~355 days/yr to be an
adequately informed voter. It's not like it takes that long to google a
candidate and some issues and catch up on what you missed.

2) If we're going the informed-voter justification, we'd be much (for large
values of "much") better off if everyone took 99% of the time they spend on
news and instead read foundational works and textbooks in political science,
economics, comparative politics, ethics, statistics, history, and government
in [home country], with maybe a smidge of modern policy pieces (e.g. think-
tank stuff, policy studies, that kind of thing).

~~~
dominotw
> keep up with the news at all ~355 days/yr

Is that what the article is discussing though?

