Alright, so I gave the new random event system a whirl, starting with a small map after selling my last prison for 5mil. (Didn't help that my pretty large prison with +800 prisoners was slow as molasses at 1x speed... There was a lot of empty space too... So pretty damn inefficient.)
Some of the events are actually interesting, in my opinion. Like more random/unplanned for prisoners. I was taking it easy with only minsec(+30-60 a day), but the game sent me a huge batch of maxsec, forcing me to put in a protectivesec area. (Dogs can and will maul unconscious prisoners... The dog's partner was pretty far away...)
Others are meh, pay attention to me or your prison will grind to an absolute halt. Broken water pipes, broken walls, burning power stations and kitchen fires. (But, kitchen fires are ok, since I brought in some firemen. They live in the kitchen now.)
The worst are the ones that tell you to do annoying things like deconstruct/dezone things already built. I'm not keen on that. Plus, the bastard spams me with hefty 50k-ish fines forever if I ignore him/leave the game on.
In short, I cannot leave the game on for hours with events on. So... yea, I'll probably only keep it on if I'm paying attention. Otherwise, turn it off when I just want to let my prison chug along and fill to overcapacity with minsec, causing them to eventually harmlessly cull themselves... (Though, I do love to mix in instigators with the minsec...)