If you’ve never been a regular consumer of the news, now really is a great time to start. No, scratch that; it’s an imperative time to start.

As college students, we owe it to society to prepare ourselves for the professional world as thoroughly as we can. By making the choice to pursue a college degree for whatever reason, we have already committed ourselves to and invested our time and energy into the future of the world.

A grasp on what’s going on in our own lives now and in the years after college is only made stronger by striving to maintain a grasp on what’s going on in others’ lives.

From the things going on in our own NIU community to the things going on at a national level, our lives and the lives of those close to use are being affected.

Equipping ourselves to realize exactly how and why our lives are being affected is the essence of why paying attention to the news is so important.

That said, there is no better reason to start paying attention to the news than the fact that news may never again be specifically catered to you in such a way as we at the Northern Star are working toward.

Whether you’ve picked up on our increased focus on multimedia and online news this semester or not, this is a HUGE idea.

Newspapers from the lowliest Podunk Daily to the Chicago Tribune and New York Times are shifting their focus to better accommodate you, the soon-to-be young professional who no longer wants to sit down and read a newspaper as your parents and grandparents did.

All that ink really is annoying anyway.

We are all young and we are all used to getting our information on the Web the moment the urge to find out something strikes. Again, this is why the entire industry is changing. And this is where we come in, us student journalists and you student citizens.

The journalism industry is looking to us, the up-and-coming journalists, to redefine and essentially save the trade. The journalism industry is looking to you to figure out what works when it comes to serving the public for years to come, as technology continues to alter and reconfigure our world.

But this is a good thing, as the means and capability to deliver breaking news on an instant basis also serves as its justification. If we have the tools to accommodate the way you consume the news (and we believe we do), then you deserve to have to have it that way.

All we are looking for is what works in the eyes of you, our reader. And feel free to send us an email, give us a call, or just stop in to tell us what might be on your mind.

We really are committed to figuring this out, and in my eyes it is as simple as succeeding or failing in the time I have here at the Northern Star.