I've had quite a few e-mails expressing similar thoughts in regards to programming news and my e-mail newsletters. Some people are getting sick of the trawl around Reddit, HN, Twitter, and the various sites, and instead prefer a curated, once weekly e-mail. It's not for everyone, of course, but it seems some people love trimming back!
Did You Hear We Got Osama?
111–120 of 212 posts
Re: Did You Hear We Got Osama?
#112I lived in the Philippines for two years and aside from emailing my family once a week, usually, I was completely ignorant of the outside world.
Someone mentioned in passing that Michael Jackson had died and I thought they were just teasing our lack of worldly knowledge.
I liked this post and I think a concept at play here is that people are afraid of the quiet as they're afraid of themselves. I experimented with different teaching methods and that while I was over in the Philippines and using silence and good questions were the most effective methods I came across outside of having genuine understanding of the person/group.
Silence.
Re: Did You Hear We Got Osama?
#113This is a topic that I've thought some on in that my company is in the recommendations space, and some thoughts on what make news recommendations difficult: The function of news is to facilitate smalltalk. I am reasonably convinced of this. News, as such, is mostly just something that you're supposed to have read so that you can get by in usual social interactions. What we read (and are supposed to have read) is very…
not only some factoids but a lot of disinformation as well, especially if the subject is contentious. Most of the news establishment is about either keeping you away from real issues or brainwashing you to their tune.
Re: Did You Hear We Got Osama?
#114Reminds me of the classic Sherlock Holmes quote: "His ignorance was as remarkable as his knowledge. Of contemporary literature, philosophy and politics he appeared to know next to nothing. Upon my quoting Thomas Carlyle, he inquired in the naivest way who he might be and what he had done. My surprise reached a climax, however, when I found incidentally that he was ignorant of the Copernican Theory and of the composit…
I love that excerpt. The Holmes books were among my favorites growing up, read all of them several times, and that was one of the most memorable exchanges. I'm a big believer that what is easy to produce (blog posts, daily news articles) is generally less valuable than what is hard to produce (books, journal articles, working code). If you want to fill your 'empty attic' with high-value information, focus on the latt…
> I'm a big believer that what is easy to produce (blog posts, daily news articles) is generally less valuable than what is hard to produce (books, journal articles, working code).
I agree with you, especially in light of your "generally" caveat, but taking the lesson from the Holmes quote above... there are contexts in which the easily accessible approach of a blog post is far more valuable than a journal article on the same topic, along with the ability to provide prompt updates when the situation changes.
Context, my dear Watson.
Re: Did You Hear We Got Osama?
#115Earlier quoted context omitted.
"It is really, really, really, really, really hard for me to find a good temporary distraction nowadays." You sound like a typical bored teenager, with too much time on their hands, wearing their boredom as a nihilistic badge of honor, expecting everyone to entertain them, while simultaneously acting as if they know everything, thereby supposedly being superior to the entertainers. If you can't find anything good to…
I tend to agree. If you're having trouble finding good content in the age of endless content, well, that's an opportunity. Hell, I could read Wikipedia for 8 hours a day and not get bored. Interesting aside, I read "... a typical bored engineer..." the first time, which also worked.
I read the same thing the first time, which indicates to me that it originally said that, but OP didn't find it condescending enough.
Re: Did You Hear We Got Osama?
#116This is a topic that I've thought some on in that my company is in the recommendations space, and some thoughts on what make news recommendations difficult: The function of news is to facilitate smalltalk. I am reasonably convinced of this. News, as such, is mostly just something that you're supposed to have read so that you can get by in usual social interactions. What we read (and are supposed to have read) is very…
You can still get this social interaction without having to follow every piece of news that comes out. Just spend some time reading a more in depth summary of something up till this point. Then when something new happens let the person you are talking to fill you in and use your overview of the subject to fit in the new piece of information and give some opinion on the whole thing.
Re: Did You Hear We Got Osama?
#117Earlier quoted context omitted.
Frequency and quality are negatively correlated when it comes to news. I would recommend Instapaper's curated list of articles, which tend to be long-form and more interesting than most, as well as The Browser ("Writing Worth Reading") for curated quality content. http://www.thebrowser.com But you're not going to find quality content many times a day, no matter where you look.
I'm sure you're right. There's just not enough people writing to explain random complex subjects to people that don't study that field. And i'm correlating the concept of "news" with interesting information, when news reporting is basically repeating that which happens every single day. Thank you for the link, that may be just what I was looking for.
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Re: Did You Hear We Got Osama?
#118This reminds me of that Bill Nguyen article, where he revealed he had never even used Facebook until recently, claiming he doesn't keep up with tech. If you're a startup founder, you can't afford to be uninformed about your competition and the industry. The answer is not reading less, but reading smarter. I don't know what the solution is, but it sure isn't limiting my consumption to 1 or 2 articles.
Re: Did You Hear We Got Osama?
#119Reminds me of the classic Sherlock Holmes quote: "His ignorance was as remarkable as his knowledge. Of contemporary literature, philosophy and politics he appeared to know next to nothing. Upon my quoting Thomas Carlyle, he inquired in the naivest way who he might be and what he had done. My surprise reached a climax, however, when I found incidentally that he was ignorant of the Copernican Theory and of the composit…
One of my favorite quotes as well, but there's some evidence in other stories that Holmes might have been trolling Watson here.
Re: Did You Hear We Got Osama?
#120Earlier quoted context omitted.
"It is really, really, really, really, really hard for me to find a good temporary distraction nowadays." You sound like a typical bored teenager, with too much time on their hands, wearing their boredom as a nihilistic badge of honor, expecting everyone to entertain them, while simultaneously acting as if they know everything, thereby supposedly being superior to the entertainers. If you can't find anything good to…
Yes. I am 16. I stay home from school because learning civics and history and math and science are super boring, so in between sessions of wallhacking on legacy counter-strike servers I refresh a startup tech news site looking for intellectually stimulating articles. You're right. I do know everything. Everything except how best to use my time when I occasionally want to waste it broadening my horizon with unusual an…
10 out of 10 for the put down but seriously between libraries, a kindle and google you have access (mostly free) to virtually the sum total of human knowledge. There is lots of stuff out there that will distract you and feed your brain, you're just going to have to cycle through more than 4 sites to get it.