Rolf Dobelli has a pdf on the toxicity of news with the conclusion that we should not read news and instead read that which requires us to think deeply.

While partial to his conclusion, his argument seems flawed. He starts by asking what news item impacted us deeply over the last year. I'd start with asking what, if anything, has changed how we think over the past year. We probably want to hear news relevant to us which would probably include the ideas in vogue (like news is bad for you).

Dobelli then attacks the delivery mechanism of news. However, while it seems deplorable, we should attempt to separate the delivery from the content. News via talking head just isn't the same as news from an RSS feed.

I think there's certainly room to improve news; from looking at some of my friends' use of facebook, it seems that the news frenzy has become a news friendzy (yes, just typing that hurt). The social transmission of news coupled with better information retrieval (firewalling) will make for a more relevant news feed, and probably reduce the psychic costs.

That's the future, though. For now, people should probably just imagine what an average perfect day would be like. Do you see yourself sitting on a couch, enjoying the morning sunlight, reading a paper? Well, who's to deny you that?

Or do you imagine a day filled with things other than news?