I keep up to date by randomly spotting it while surfing around the 'net and if I see it often enough and for long enough (a year at least) it starts to register in my brain that it might be something to take seriously. 99.9999999% of all IT related "news" sites, magazines etc are paid for by industry, they are not independant in any sense of the word, they are just another form of advertising, utter cat vomit, not worth the paper or bytes they are printed on and fads come and go way too often in this business to take anything new seriously until it has a proven track record. You could always waste some expense money on "conferences" you *will* get the exact same cat vomit in person but at least with a conference you can fool other people, perhaps even yourself that it's "educational" and more importantly you can party and socialize while you're there and maybe get in some non computer related recreational activity to make it all worthwhile.
When everyone is a hero no one is a hero.