Are Newspapers Doomed?

History is happening before our eyes. The New Yorker published an article by James Surowiecki which speculates that newspapers may soon disappear. Indeed, the Tribune Company filed for bankruptcy last week. Surowiecki says that others will soon follow. The Miami Herald and the San Diego Union-Tribune are reportedly on the selling block, while lawmakers in Connecticut are trying to keep two newspapers there afloat. Even the New York Times Company has slashed its dividend and announced that it would borrow against its headquarters to avoid cash-flow problems.

"There's no mystery as to the source of all the trouble: advertising revenue has dried up," writes Surowiecki. He blames several factors, including both the overall economic climate of today plus competition from broadcast media and the Internet. In addition, many traditional advertisers, like big department stores, are struggling, and the bursting of the housing bubble has devastated real-estate advertising.

Newspapers almost owned the classified ad business and apparently thought it was theirs forever. To their surprise, Craig's List and similar web sites have stolen the classified ad business while the newspapers slept.

Surowiecki points out that newspaper web sites are often more popular than the printed newspapers themselves, but the web sites typically generate less revenue.

You can find this interesting article at http://www.newyorker.com/talk/financial/2008/12/22/081222ta_talk_surowiecki.

Comments

[theKiwi]

The two Detroit newspapers announced last week that their home delivery of newspapers would be cut back to only 3 days a week in 2009 - Thursday, Friday and Sunday.

They'll still print on other days for papers to be sold in stores, but they're moving resources to online publishing.

"Hunke said the strategy was driven less by declining advertising revenue and circulation in a dour Michigan economy than by soaring costs for newsprint, ink and fuel."

http://www.freep.com/article/20081216/FREEPRESS/81216032

Roger

[Dae Powell]

I like newspapers. I sincerely hope they do not disappear. They have traditionally covered stories about the populace, which are unavailable elsewhere. There is hardly an area of the newspaper that cannot be profitably used by a savvy genealogist.

Long live the newspaper industry.

Happy Dae.
http://ShoeStringGenealogy.com

[Tim]

Local newspapers are, and always have been, the best source of news about their surrounding community. The problems the larger papers are having is the result of their attempts to cover all the nation-wide and world news, more often than not coloring it with their own opinions. The "big" news can be had anywhere, and most people want their news without the commentary. The big newspapers don't even try to hide their bias anymore.

No unbiased, honest journalist would "endorse" and candidate or bill. And people want to know what is going on without having the editors' and reporters' opinions shoved in their faces all the time.

I don't think the smaller local papers will disappear as soon as the large papers. In fact, they may do even better once the big guys are out of the way. If they were smart they would charge a small fee for their online content, but it would have to be less than the printed version. My local paper provides all their online content for free, but it is only available for a few days. I wouldn't subscribe, just as I don't now, but many people would be happy to get their local newspaper in electronic form for less instead of a printed copy.

If they can't figure out how to survive they should go away.

[Jennie Vertrees]

I live in a pristine area of North Missouri and my closest city is over 90 miles away. People here depend on their local newspapers, which are almost all a weekly paper, for the events and information about the people each one knows within the local area. Yes, there is advertising as that is what keeps any newspaper viable, unless the owner has a good income from other sources. Few owners in this area could keep a paper viable without the advertising.
I volunteer time, usually a few hours a week for one of our local papers. I also have written a weekly local history column for a number of years. I enjoy local history and have pored over the available newspapers of the area for the last 116 years as well as interviewing longtime merchants in the area and older citizens of the area. This has brought a lot of family histories, written from as far back as 1850, to my attention and I have used excerpts in my column as well. It is amazing how helpful some of this material has been to persons searching for their ancestors, who lived in this county in the early days of the county.
I have written all this to support my feeling that the local newspapers will survive for a longer period of time than the big city dailies, which can never be as personal as the "county papers" of this area and other small town areas.

[Richard Brandstetter]

It not just Newspapers that are disappearing just today in my PC Magazine was a card saying that after the January Issue will discontinue its print edition. Thy say they are Excited about there digital edition. The January issues is small and I know Magazines have been going out of print all the years but this is the first one that has continue that has continue as a digital edition. My renewal check cleared last week.

“The big newspapers don't even try to hide their bias anymore”
Out of the Blue I got a new Health Magazine for Men came on Nov 2 with Obama on the cover and just last week I got a email about the next Issue about Obama way of life and how it be good for my health.

And just look at ABC NBC and others there world my be moving over to the NET.

[Bonnie]

To me sitting in front of a computer screen and clicking a mouse key to scan down a page of written text is a far cry from curling up in your favorite easy chair with a paper in hand and leisurely reading the articles. Let's hope that the decline of papers isn't one more indication that our society is moving further and further away from being an educated, informed, and well read citizenry.

[sue maxwell]

I think that one reason they are having trouble is that they are biased and should take some responsibility for their own problems. Some of us have stopped reading them and listening to the news media because of this and look to other sources for our news. Reading the NYTimes now is not like reading it in the 1850's when it was more factual. The same thing applies to books- many are too biased, and I find that older books are more honest in their approach and the writers are not aiming to create a public viewpoint.

Our local newspaper does not represent the conservative nature of our community, and since they have no competition, they can say whatever they want. But we don't subscribe as do many others. They must be desperate as every once in a while they start delivering it free. They used to have a columnist who made fun of and criticized everyone who did anything good in the community. His column was called Snide Remarks- which is exactly what it was.

I would like to see newspapers return to reporting facts rather than promoting a certain agenda. I think the reporting of the Presidential election was typical. Alot of things were not said that should have been said. Lets have good newpapers like we used to. Sue