Thing 12 - Socialism

How do we maintain our grounding in this age of information? These social media sites are yet another portal to what's happening. The thing is, how much of this stuff do we really need to know? Is it so important to always be right on top of the latest "news" item? I can see the possible relevance of this for reference librarians, but it could also become another time waster. If the librarian is always looking at the computer, will a patron feel comfortable approaching her or assume that she is busy?