4 Reasons You Definitely Need A News App
By Alexa August
In being a little bit of a nerdy, news-junkie I started to notice a pattern amongst millennials. Sitting in a lecture hall looking at a sea of laptops screens I’d generally see a mixture of Buzzfeed, Thought Catalog, Facebook, online shopping, and one kid actually taking notes. Even at work when people took breaks from their daily spreadsheets, computer screens were mostly filled with social media pages.
This pattern I noticed got me thinking: what about the news? Is it really that uncommon to see a college student reading the news in class or a young professional reading the news at work? In an era where news is so easily accessible, why are more people not taking advantage?
Now, I’m all too familiar with the eye rolls when I ask my friends if they’ve heard about the latest happening in the world. And I’m no stranger to being the only person in a bar watching the presidential debate (hey, a girls gotta socialize too).
So here are just four (I could list more) reasons you need a news app, like, yesterday.
1. You live in the world, not a bubble.
As much as you’d like to think your world doesn’t extend past your social circle, it does. And newsflash: you can’t opt out. You’re stuck living in the world so you might as well have some sort of idea about what goes on in it. And just when you think you can use the excuse of ,“Well that doesn’t affect me”, it probably does. I mean hello! Gas prices don’t just rise and fall for no reason.
2. It actually makes you intelligent.
Or at the very least it makes you SEEM intelligent. It’s a little bit like wearing glasses to a presentation to make you look smarter. Even just reading some news headlines will give you some sort of idea about what’s going on in the world around you. Simply bringing up one of those headlines will lead people to believe that you actually read the news. No one has to know you just scroll through headlines everyday, and definitely no one has to know that you learned about the Iran Deal on Snapchat’s live stories.
3. It gives you something to talk about.
Believe it or not, other people like discussing more than your fresh manicure, the happenings of the Kardashians, and the most recent Real Housewives episode (this is shocking, I know). But it truly does give you something to talk about, especially with people you may not have much in common with. Of course you can always bring up the weather or how ‘bout them Cowboys but when you realize you didn’t watch more than three seconds of the game you might need a backup strategy.
4. You should probably care.
All in all, you really should care about what’s going on in the world around you. So maybe break up your morning routine of checking Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram before getting out of bed and throw a news app into the mix. More informed people make the world a better place.