,
4 tweets,
1 min read
Read on Twitter
Who'd have thought that if people could choose their own news, they'd choose the stories that made them angry? We take it for granted now, but it really is surprising. Cynical editors used to think "if it bleeds, it leads" was as low as you could go. But people like anger more.
Hypothesis: Maybe news has become a business (like alcohol and virtual goods) where revenue is disproportionately driven by heavy consumers (aka "whales"), and they are driving this. Maybe 5% of the population is insatiably angry. Talk radio suggests this is plausible.
Further hypothesis: A publication or news show can't simultaneously induce anger on the right and the left. So the high-minded, politically neutral news outlet like e.g. the NYT or WaPo used to be, is a thing of the past. Now they have to pick sides. Certainly the NYT has.
To the extent this is what the news is becoming, it's something to avoid. When I was a kid, it was impressive to consume a lot of news. Someone who subscribed to 5 newspapers would brag about that. But it's not impressive to consume a lot of Fox News. It's not even neutral.
