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Pastimes : Discussion Thread -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: one_less who wrote (3614)	3/8/2010 11:28:50 AM
From: TimF	1 Recommendation Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 3816

The news (or at least many segments of it) does cater to the lowest common denominator in many ways, but more sophisticated analysis of more serious problems is available, probably more available than it was in the past. Some segments of news have in some ways declined, but there are many new news sources, and also serious news from some old sources. Its not as if in the past people didn't focus on gossip and superficial things, its just that in the past (at least the relatively distant past), it was more local, when now we have national and international gossip about celebrities, rather than the town drunk, or the "loose woman" down the street, or perhaps (to the extent they couldn't keep things quiet) the follies of the local nobles. Basically the world is more interconnected, and news from everywhere is available, but human nature has not changed, so a lot of the news will be the same old crap on a different scale. Its not as if good stuff isn't out there, but if you care about the more superficial stories they will be very easy to find. Making an abrupt transition to a different topic - One of the ones you had posted as one of the serious issues that should get more attention, water shortages. The best thing we can do to deal with such problems, is to stop subsidizing water. Make users pay real market costs, and (when its scarce enough for such costs to be significant) they will use less of it. That deals with the demand side far more than the supply side, but if you reduce demand more supply holds up better (aquifers don't get drained and then have salt or contaminated water fill in the empty space, etc.)