You wouldn't let someone else choose what you eat. Why let someone else choose what you know?

A lot of people in 2024 let social algorithms decide what they knew and this was the result:

We need to do better at informing ourselves. Democracy only works if we operate from the same set of facts, and right now that is not happening.

The steps I recommend here are no guarantee that you'll be well-informed. Misinformation and disinformation are everywhere, and they're almost impossible to avoid. The methods below are tools to try to make some rational sense of what's happening in the world, but it's up to you to use them responsibly.

How to curate your own news

Really simple syndication (RSS) is one of the oldest technologies on the web. Almost every website outputs RSS feeds, which send content (articles, images, videos, podcasts) to your personal reader. You decide what you see, and you see it as it comes out into the world, not when some algorithm decides to show it to you.

With RSS there is no algorithm filtering what you read. Choose the writers or sources you subscribe to. Browse content from your selected sources in real-time, in the order each piece was published. Organize them how you like. Filter out keywords or topics if you choose. Add new sources as you find them. Remove sources anytime.

STEP BY STEP INSTRUCTIONS w links

Bypassing paywalls

I use Pocket to bypass most paywalls, and archive stories to read later as I'm browsing the feeds. The free version works fine.