How do I read The Economist?
I am a subscriber of The Economist and fairly satisfied with the wide coverage. I've uninstall all other news applications across all my devices. I like that my coverage is delayed by a few days (at most a week) and never felt that I am missing out on anything. This allows for reporting that is far more researched instead of mindless hyperboles. Opinion pieces are usually well-balanced. The Economist, however, finds itself in a tough spot on hot-button issue like race. Thankfully, the "Letters" section welcomes feedback from many readers with opposing views and keeps the discourse healthy.
My main challenge is that there is much quality content but only little time to consume. I characterize this, more dramatically, as an information firehose. This post is an attempt to deliberately make up a preference order for topics that matter to me the most.
Everything
The Economist categorizes all articles into sections below 1.
- The world this week
- Leaders
- Letters
- Briefing
- United States
- The Americas
- Asia
- China
- Middle East & Africa
- Europe
- Britain
- International
- Business
- Finance & economics
- Science & technology
- Books & arts
- Economic & financial indicators
- Graphic detail
- Obituary
Sometimes, there are other special sections.
- By invitation
- Special report
- Technology Quarterly
My Picks
Barring a few interesting pieces in other sections, I'm usually most interested in these.
- The world this week
- Leaders
- Letters
- Briefing
- Asia
- Finance & economics
- Science & technology
- Books & arts
- Graphic detail
- Obituary
Reading Strategy
A set of pre-decided favorite sections has not been satisfactory. Not that I want to read everything, I do feel there has to be a better reading strategy to maximize impact.
The search for meta-processes for reading is still on.
Footnotes
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I will enumerate in more detail what each section is about at some point. ↩