# When do you get your news? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [May 8, 2012, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-do-you-get-your-news/621236 "2012-05-08T01:51:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Kozmik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8dc957/32.png) [@Kozmik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kozmik)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2012, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-do-you-get-your-news/621236/21 "2012-05-09T16:00:09Z")
> [@Zeldar](#): > > So I didn’t vote in your poll. Good idea, though! 🙂 I came up with this poll to answer this question: Is news what you experience in 24 hours or is news the events that happen in 24 hours? It seems that how one person experiences the 24-hour news cycle can be different from how another person experiences the 24-hour news cycle? As of this post, the 24-hour news cycle is half-way through. What is the 24-hour news cycle? Maybe I’m looking at it the wrong way. Then again, maybe I’m not. ---
**Author:** ![Kozmik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8dc957/32.png) [@Kozmik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kozmik)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2012, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-do-you-get-your-news/621236/22 "2012-05-10T03:59:08Z")
After 23 voters: ```auto 12 AM 3 13.04% 1 AM 2 8.70% 2 AM 2 8.70% 3 AM 2 8.70% 4 AM 1 4.35% 5 AM 3 13.04% 6 AM 7 30.43% 7 AM 8 34.78% 8 AM 9 39.13% 9 AM 8 34.78% 10 AM 5 21.74% 11 AM 5 21.74% 12 PM 8 34.78% 1 PM 5 21.74% 2 PM 4 17.39% 3 PM 4 17.39% 4 PM 6 26.09% 5 PM 6 26.09% 6 PM 7 30.43% 7 PM 4 17.39% 8 PM 4 17.39% 9 PM 7 30.43% 10 PM 8 34.78% 11 PM 5 21.74% ``` It seems alot of Dopers get their news between 6 AM and 9 AM. That intuitively makes sense. Waking up, having breakfast, watching/reading the news, going to work or going about one’s day. I’m still working out my news routine. Here’s my news routine: Go to [time.gov](http://www.time.gov/timezone.cgi?Eastern/d/-5/java) (Eastern time zone) before 12 AM and watch as the 24-hour news cycle begins at 00:00:00. Marshall McLuhan would be proud. Go to [Google News](http://news.google.com/) between 12 AM and 5 AM (or sleep). Turn TV to CNN at 5 AM. Watch for an hour. Get _The New York Times_, in print or in PDF at 6 AM. Finish reading at 7 AM. Now I know the news. What’s your news routine? Does anyone watch CNN between 12 PM and 5 PM? ---
**Author:** ![Kozmik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8dc957/32.png) [@Kozmik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kozmik)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2012, 12:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-do-you-get-your-news/621236/23 "2012-05-10T12:53:20Z")
Done. I watched on [time.gov](http://time.gov) as the 24-hour news cycle began. I slept. I woke up shortly before 5 AM. I turned the on the TV to CNN. I watched CNN from 5 AM to 6 AM. At 6 AM, I went out to get _The New York Times_. Got a copy of _The New York Times_ and read it from around 6 AM to around 7 AM. Now I’m posting on The Straight Dope Message Board. Total time spent on news: 2 hours. Now I have the rest of the day until I go to work later in the afternoon. How much time in a 24 hour day do you spend on news? What did I learn since _yesterday’s_ 24-hour news cycle began? I had no idea, while watching the President speak at SUNY yesterday at 1:30 PM, that before he left the White House for Albany, New York, he would have a discussion with aides in the Oval Office and that he would decide to announce his endorsement of same sex marriage later that day. However, I did have a notion of this because of what the Vice President said about same sex marriage. ---
**Author:** ![LawMonkey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/d6d6ee/32.png) [@LawMonkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LawMonkey)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2012, 1:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-do-you-get-your-news/621236/24 "2012-05-10T13:19:52Z")
Some NPR stations carry the BBC World Service overnight; when my schedule skewed much later and I was going outside to smoke on a regular basis, I’d listen to the beeb all the time. Me, I mostly get my news–what little of it I manage to get–while I’m taking a shower in the morning and have NPR on. Aside from that and a few podcasts, I’ve also got a subscription to the Financial Times (which I read less often than I should) and there’s those damned screens in the elevators. ---
**Author:** ![Kozmik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8dc957/32.png) [@Kozmik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kozmik)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2012, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-do-you-get-your-news/621236/25 "2012-05-10T14:22:58Z")
> [@LawMonkey](#): > > Aside from that and a few podcasts, I’ve also got a subscription to the Financial Times (which I read less often than I should) Interesting that you should say that. Like I posted, I’m still working out my news routine. I use to watch CNN _more_ often than I should. I’d watch CNN from 12 PM to 6 PM. That’s 6 hours! Now, as I last posted, I watch CNN from 5 AM to 6 AM and then read _The New York Times_ from around 6 AM to around 7 AM. That’s 2 hours. So instead of spending 6 hours on the news I spend 2 hours on the news and, ironically, I’m more informed. Timing, also, is everything to being more informed. I get my 2 hours of news earlier in the day, which should hopefully free up more of my day. Oh, yeah, I also like watching ABC World News or NBC Nightly News and watching The Tonight Show. I spend 3 hours in a 24-hour day getting news. 3 hours in a 24-hour day. That’s not obsessive, is it? I have a theory about _when_ people get their news. People who get their news at 7 AM from Good Morning America are different from people who get their news at 5 AM from CNN. I’m not talking about a function of going to work later or earlier - I’m talking about someone intentionally getting up at 5 AM _instead of getting up at 7 AM_ so that they can get the earlier news in the 24-hour news cycle. And people that get their news before 5 AM from Google News? I am deeply fascinated by them. Probably hackers who will _make_ the news. They’re like Neo in that opening scene in The Matrix. There’s just something about seeing someone reading _The New York Times_ at 6 AM that screams “journalist!” Yeah, when I finished reading _The New York Times_ at around 7 AM today, [this](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMZwZiU0kKs) is what I did. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![control-z](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/eada6e/32.png) [@control-z](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/control-z)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2012, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-do-you-get-your-news/621236/26 "2012-05-10T14:49:49Z")
News briefs on the Today Show, and then skim through pre-recorded local 5:00 and/or 6:00 news and sometimes NBC Nightly News. ---
**Author:** ![Kozmik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8dc957/32.png) [@Kozmik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kozmik)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2012, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-do-you-get-your-news/621236/27 "2012-05-10T18:40:41Z")
> [@control-z](#): > > News briefs on the Today Show, and then skim through pre-recorded local 5:00 and/or 6:00 news and sometimes NBC Nightly News. Yes! Instead of watching CNN for 6 hours, watch NBC Nightly News for half an hour. Does anyone else do that? Instead of watching Good Morning America for 2 hours, watch CNN for an hour at 5 AM and then read _The New York Times_ for about an hour at 6 AM. Finish reading through _The New York Times_ at around 7 AM and be done with the news when Good Morning America _begins_. Does anyone else do this? Who checks the news between 12 AM and 5 AM? People in the financial industry, people in politics, people in the military? Journalists? The President? And why isn’t there a lot of news between 12 AM and 5 AM as there seems to be between 12 PM and 5 PM? Intuitively, one would think that the first five hours of the news cycle would be very active, yet, there is the proverbial calm before the storm. ---
**Author:** ![Kozmik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8dc957/32.png) [@Kozmik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kozmik)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2012, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-do-you-get-your-news/621236/28 "2012-05-11T17:35:18Z")
After 27 voters: ```auto **12 AM 3 11.11% 1 AM 2 7.41% 2 AM 2 7.41% 3 AM 3 11.11% 4 AM 1 3.70% 5 AM 3 11.11% ** 6 AM 7 25.93% 7 AM 9 33.33% 8 AM 10 37.04% 9 AM 11 40.74% 10 AM 5 18.52% 11 AM 5 18.52% 12 PM 8 29.63% 1 PM 5 18.52% 2 PM 4 14.81% 3 PM 4 14.81% 4 PM 6 22.22% 5 PM 6 22.22% 6 PM 8 29.63% 7 PM 4 14.81% 8 PM 4 14.81% 9 PM 7 25.93% 10 PM 8 29.63% 11 PM 5 18.52% ``` Why isn’t there much news in the 24-hour news cycle **_before_ 6 AM**? What is news? What is the 24-hour news cycle? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-do-you-get-your-news/621236.md?page=1)