You're asking me to enumerate the benefits of knowing what's going on the world around you? It's probably not relevant or beneficial if it's something like miners being trapped in a cave on the other side of the planet, but when you get down to your local community you might want to know about things like:

- Road closures - Boil orders - Product recalls - Neighborhood breakins - Weather forecasts and alerts - Updated laws and court rulings that might impact you - Public safety notices - Health inspections - Public works projects - and a zillion other things that happen as a consequence of living in a complex society