News of the NewsIt is a shameful state of affairs. We now have the ability to hear more of what's happening in the world, to experience more of life's breadth, but instead we recycle the same minutia for hours at a stretch. We don't ever get depth from the limited number of events that repeat before our eyes. We don't experience the width or depth of the ocean of information that is out there; instead, we're limited to splashing around in a puddle.
There was a time when "news" wasn't pushed at us all day long. Once upon a time, one-hour news shows were a novelty. For the longest time, the major broadcast networks took 30 minutes each day to acquaint us with what was happening in the world and around the country. The knowledge we gained from those half-hours was concise and informative. We learned about injustice and fought for civil rights. We learned about the war in Vietnam and demanded an end to it. We learned about the death of a president and mourned as one. We learned important things, for the most part, and tried to make good use of the information.
Before that, evening news programs were even shorter. It was fifty years ago today that the CBS Evening News expanded from 15 minutes to 30 and became the USA's first half-hour weeknight news show. News programming gave us the who, what, when, where, and why for the day, then moved on to other news on another day. Today, we settle for less news and it's spread as thinly as technology will all.
And that's the way it is.
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