I'm sure this plaid a role in him being so productive.
But I do think its my obligation to read the news. Even if it makes me less productive. Without the news I would have never learned about Aarons hack and his trial. Of course, just knowing the news is not enough. One has to act. In the case of Aaron, we didn't act.
Maybe it depends on how you define "news". Everything I know about Aaron Swartz, I know from following links I encountered here. True, this is a "news" site, but it's filtered news; I think that's an important point. The problem with "mainstream" news media is not just that they're bad at reporting; they're also bad at filtering, because their filter criterion is what will sell papers/get more viewers, rather than what information is genuinely of value to the most readers.
Here we filter for karma..
I don't think that it's a matter of productivity. I don;t read news because it presents me with a bunch of inactionable information-- I can't -do- anything about any of the stories that I read in the news and so there's no use building up impotent rage about those things.
I'm actually pretty informed about "the news" but I don't read any newspaper sites unless I get links to them, and I certainly don't watch TV news.
Part of the problem with that is some people might end up getting all their news from websites that feature crazy conspiracy theory stuff, like Alex Jones or whatever.
Let's say you knew of Aaron's plight. Would this news have changed your life for the better by you getting this knowledge the day it happened?
I didn't know about Aaron until all the articles started popping up here. Only curiosity drove me to find out the story, no real need or purpose.