Would you feel a sense of loss if your local newspaper shut down?
Do you think your local paper is a public trust and should there be a bailout to help local media concerns by the Federal government?
Why aren’t local newspapers loved by their community?
Here are two interesting articles — one by the Pew Research Company — click here — and one in Alley Insider — click here — that details how Ebay — Craigslist and Google crushed the local news media business model in classifieds — the most profitable part of the new paper’s income statement.
Ironically — Google — Ebay and Craigslist are all very popular brands and are more loved than needed in the consumer’s mind set.
So — what happened? Why aren’t newspapers loved by the majority of their community?
For the record — I subscribe to newspapers as a matter of payback — I get all of my news online and some on television; but I know how integrated local media concerns are in our community. I want our local newspapers to stay in business and win — I think they are a needed utility in our daily lives. But why don’t more people feel this way? Post away and share your thoughts.
I’m thinking that papers like the Post and Washington Times should go to an Evening edition with reports on the days news not yesterdays news like we get now.
Go Caps!
Teddy, I have my local paper and The Chief delivered to my house. I also subscribe to them online (extra charge). And my husband buys the NY Times. I would miss my newspapers. Holding the paper in my hand is what I grew up with. There is a familiar factor to it. There is a comfort factor to it. I even like seeing them around my house. Not too many, but a few. But a bailout? I am tied of bailouts. I am more worried about who is going to bailout our children in the not so distant future.
As an aspiring print journalist (and huge caps fan!) I remain confident that online news and newspapers can continue to co-exist. The issue is that print media is not adapting to a new role- analysis and in depth reporting. Newspapers can’t get by saying what happened at yesterdays committee hearing- everyone already know! We have to learn to talk about why what happened happened, and why it mattered. Printed newspapers don’t have to go away- they just need to evolve their product so it is palatable and useful to the modern news consumer. This doesn’t mean any loss of ethics- just a change in news philosophy.
Bailing out newspapers is bad because it’s bad to reward outdated businesses based on outdated tech. Also, newspapers, which traditionally can be considered bloated monopolies, don’t know how to innovate. The internet is killing the newspaper because anyone can get information quickly and just because newspapers go away doesn’t mean sources will. And last but not least, a government subsidized “free press” isn’t a “free press” at all.
If it can’t profit with a good model or a changing model, it should shut down.
Bailouts were a mistake in every industry that has accepted them.
ted- how do you feel about Joe Bennati calling the Pens games on VS? It makes me sick to my stomach. Someone at my office tried to convince me that we are lucky to have a skilled guy like Joe B. calling our games. I politley disagreed.
dan
I think that the times have simply changed faster than the newspapers have adapted. Newspapers can’t rely on nostalgia or sympathy subscriptions to keep running – they need to find a better way to deliver their content to subscribers. Maybe the solution is in something like the Kindle – updated daily with the online version. Or maybe they’ll just have to learn to monetize their content online without a paying subscription base. People want their information faster every day – only the digital world can keep up.
I think it’s pretty simple user behaviour. The common denominator is searching vs. browsing. When the only option available to us was browsing tiny print in the local daily for one of only a few listed items matching our interest, fair enough!
But with eBay, Craigslist, and Google have come the ability to Search, as an artefact of the second important asset: increased inventory. These sites contain far more selection and variability than is physically possible in a newspaper.
The thing that’s happening currently is a shift toward notification. Realtime search engines can solicit what you’re looking for and find it for you from static listings and as new ones are coming up. So now that’s an exponential increase over the value and exposure derived from the local daily.
Now the thing is — anyone could have utilized the web to build these sorts of tools. Why not the local dailies? Like the banking bailout of 2008, should we reward these guys for sticking their heads in the sand and ignoring the obvious?
I say this is a tremendous period of creative destruction. Newspapers got fat and absorbed an enormous amount of capital to fund consolidation, empire-building, and ego gratification. “Lord” Conrad Black could have personally bankrolled Google, eBay, and Craigslist to profitability with the money some say he embezzled from Hollinger Corp.
I say let them die. The badly stained corporations that house local dailies are the real problem — not the concept of the local daily itself. The model cannot evolve under current conditions. With these shells out of the way others will emerge to take their place.
I have a local paper?
Whether they should receive financial support or not, *if* they did get any I would say this is more something that should come from local government.
If your local government is too small to help, maybe your local news is something you’re already hearing at the general store or the farmer’s market.
Like you, Ted, I get most of my news online; very little on television. I subscribe to three print newspapers, including the Wall Street Journal, which I also get online (and prefer online, but the WSJ INSISTS on sending me the print edition for print circulation numbers). I read the Detroit sports sections online every day, too (I’m a BIG Red Wings fan; sorry).
To your point: Journalism is alive and well. It is merely a distribution channel that is disappearing. Print has had a great 400-plus-years run. All good things come to an end. Technology has (over)lapped print, and it is print journalists, naturally, who are most concerned, though mainly for their jobs.
Print serves the Washington Capitals well (who thought we’d ever say that?!). It’s great free advertising, as you are well aware. But print’s survival is a moot point, especially as the technology of distributing news and information advances.
I share your desire for local newspapers to stay in business. The Winchester Star recently discontinued the weekly Valley Scope, which I really enjoyed reading to learn about local events.
Two advantages of newspapers are that they can also be used to help start fires in the fireplace and that they are great for bathroom reading. At our Memorial Day cookout, a friend mentioned dropping his blackberry in the toilet!
If interested in more on this topic, check out: http://lowtechtimes.com/2008/09/09/read-local-newspapers/
I subscribe to the Washington Post in paper and Kindle formats and consider independent reporting to be very important. That said, I would oppose a bailout, because that just picks a winning format for delivery – on paper. Ebay, Google, etc. certainly hurt the papers, but the choices by news organizations also hurt themselves. They choose to give away the content on the internet. I have reasons for subscribing, but I can certainly see why it would be irrational for people in other circumstances to skip a subscription and get news online.
I don’t know the answer to how they need to turn things around, but it’s not a bailout. The idea of mixing government with the institutions meant to keep them accountable is a bad idea.
As for why people don’t love papers, (a) issues of biase (real or perceived), (b) a sense that reporters are not really part of the community (many reporters at the big papers are Ivy Leaguers. Nothing wrong with that, but not representative of the community), and (c) I think people don’t realize what we have. They can get news from aggregators and never think about where the information comes from. If it was gone, people would miss it.
I don’t think people will miss the physical newspaper, but they will miss the news, and merchants will miss a very targeted way to reach local customers. It’s a shame that civic involvement is not higher, and local papers/journalism drive a good deal of that.
It’s a good question. My opinion is that people see more and more of the newspapers being beholden to corporate interests. I don’t know if it was always the case or if it is just more visible now. I feel like newspapers are only interested in making money and will work their articles to meet that end. TV news does this, too… (Your child may already be playing with something that will kill them, tune in at 11 to see what it is). It’s pandering.
The newspapers’ role was always in the public trust… investigating government and corporate entities. Now, those entities own the newspapers (at least, that’s the perception).
I suspect I’m not in the majority, though. Just offering my opinion.
FWIW after a lifetime (I’m 47) of buying the Washington Post, I’ve given up after their last bunch of changes. No more Book World, they’ve moved the Business section to the main section and shrunk the sports section, including regurgitated chat sessions from a day or two before. After the Caps season ended, there’s no real reason to buy the Post anymore. Even if I did I now need a magnifying glass to do the crossword puzzle.
The Sunday NY Times is the best newspaper purchase out there. I’ll continue to buy that. USA Today is an on again, off again purchase for me. I’ll buy it a couple days in a row, then forget about it for a week, then buy it again. It’s McPaper.
I used to deliver the Post proudly when I was a teenager so I felt a sense of loyalty to purchasing and reading the paper. Now it really doesn’t matter to me anymore and that’s sad.