Here’s how I break through the media clutter
The only media I will ever for pay for are Apple Music and Netflix.
Over the past two days, I logged every piece of media I consumed and I used an app to log my phone usage. Whether I was listening to the new James Blake album or checking Twitter for the latest updates, I realized that I check my phone 38 times a day.
This sounds absolutely ridiculous, right? Although this may appear extraordinary, the average American picks up their phone 80 times a day. After looking further at my report, I realized that even though I do check my phone less, I check it for long quantities at a time. On the average weekday, I use my phone for 3 hours and 42 minutes. Two of those hours are spent in the evenings when I have more free time after school and work. I also use my laptop more than I use my phone since I do all of school work on it. Furthermore, I do not have cable and I prefer to watch videos on my laptop than a TV.
But out of those 38 times, I pick up my phone, only 10 percent of my phone usage is devoted to listening or looking at different media outlets for 100 percent free. According to CNBC, 40 percent of U.S. millennials pay for the news, “whether it’s a print newspaper, a digital news app or an email newsletter”. Although 40 percent is less than half of millennials, I am shocked that anyone would pay for news when free sources exist.
Before I was able to understand how to effectively sift through media, I struggled with balancing how to digest enough media without feeling overwhelmed by the growing number of outlets. I had multiple news apps on my phone, I subscribed to different newsletters, I kept up with trending topics on social media, and yet I still felt that I knew absolutely nothing about what was going in the world. It was like I was at the center of a media tornado, with all the different outlets surrounding me, but I could never grasp any of them. At the end of the day, I was overwhelmed by all the email and phone notifications of new articles and I felt uninformed.
Once I discovered daily news podcasts and newsletters, I was finally able to find that harmony I yearned for. Some of my current favorites include the Skimm and The Daily, since they do all the work for me of combing through articles to find resources. Since both deliver news straight to my phone, getting news couldn’t be easier and I actually know what’s going on.
Why would I pay for the New York Times, to have to look through all the articles for the news that I care about? Why would I go through all this extra work and pay for it when I could listen to a free podcast at my own leisure?
I once had a professor that said, “In order to fully grasp an issue, read an article for, against, and one that is neutral on the subject matter”. In theory, this sounds like the perfect way to digest the news, but to frank- no one has time to read 3 times the amount of sources. Although it may appear that I am getting news through few sources, the sources I have chosen do a great job of combing through the “fake news” to provide me with different viewpoints on important topics.
