I love thinking about words and their origins. Having done no research on this particular word, I have always assumed that the "news", that general word for everything brought to us by the media, came from being told what was new in the world, starting back when information was passed from person to person in the great oral tradition that preceded the printed word.
The word was even added to other words as a descriptive: news print (the paper on which the news was printed), newspaper (the package of news print delivered to the world), news reporter (the person who searched out the story and wrote it so it could be printed in the newspaper), news boy or newsies (the young person who at first stood on the corner and shouted the headlines so people would buy the newspaper and later who, by foot and by bicycle, delivered the newspaper to homes).
The word was used in many ways because it was important, it meant something new was happening and we needed to know what that new thing was. Even today, in the age of the internet and 24/7 coverage, we expect the news to bring us something new, or at least a new twist on the story.
Given that background, I had to laugh at the subject matter from the New York Times California Today email I received this morning.
"California Today: Wildfires, a Heat Wave, Power Outages and a Pandemic"
So? What else is new? Tell us something we don't know. heheheheheh
Seriously, everyone of these stories did add something new to my understanding of each of those events which are all too present in California lives right now. It was just funny when I read our old lives laid out so very clearly as if they were new news. Ah well, there's this pandemic and I guess we find our distractions where we can.
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