The Newspaper is Dead tagged: , , , , , , , ,

The Newspaper is Dead

Posted by Claire Connelly in Media

Government aid isn’t going to save newspapers.

Are they crazy?

How can newspapers expect to remain truly independent if the only lifeline keeping them alive is a government bail-out?

Talk about sleeping with the enemy.

Connecticut lawmaker Frank Nicastro argues that if newspapers were to accept the proposal for a bail out, “(you) can’t expect a watchdog to bite the hand that feeds it.”

In his blog, Jules Crittenden argues, “if you want to save the news industry, post a prize for the person who figures out a new way to finance it, and a cheap way to get reading devices in everyone’s hands.

Throwing out the FCC’s cross-ownership ban once and for all might also help, though I suspect that horse is edging for the door if it hasn’t already bolted. How many TV networks want to saddle themselves with pulp anvils at this point?

If government intervention is really necessary, I say we go full Stalin.

Round up and shoot a few editors and publishers who insist on producing aggressively boring, unresponsive products with bloated staffs and raging senses of entitlement.

The others will notice.

But don’t reward people with a 20th-century mentality, 19th-century technology, and no business sense whatsoever.”

Here’s an original idea – go online.

(And everybody reading this simultaneously smacks their foreheads and says “well duh!”)

For some reason which I cannot fathom, American and Australian media outlets are of some foolish misapprehension that online media = light entertainment, aka “the death of independent journalism.” This just simply isn’t the case.

Newsflash Mr. Crittenden: the forum for accessible digital news already exists.

It’s content we should be concerned about. The problem isn’t infrastructure. The infrastructure is already there (in theory): iPhones, PDA’s, Blackberries, home media centres – just four out of a handful of devices that are making news consumption accessible anytime, anywhere.

The problem is newspapers dragging their feet.

The technology is already here, the “revolution” has already happened, but it would be nice to go to the SMH on my iPhone without it crashing the browser.

Newspapers need to invest and overhaul their web-pages and portable digital news services and they need to dramatically improve their content. Just because it’s the internet doesn’t mean readers want to have their intelligence insulted.

The rise of the blogosphere hasn’t even peeked yet, but already we have seen that readership trends are changing dramatically: In 2005 the Carnegie Corporation released a report about the changing habits of news consumption and what it means for the future of the news industry.

It showed that consumers between the ages of 18-34 increasingly use the internet as their chosen medium for news consumption. At the time the report was released, television was the most utilised source of news but this has since changed. The internet is fast becoming the favored destination of news for young people.

The report showed that 44% of the study’s respondents said they use the internet at least once a day for news, compared to the meager 19% who buy newspapers on a daily basis.

A three year projection from the time of the report found that 39% of people expected to increase their use of the internet as a news forum.

Only 8% expected to increase their use of newspapers.

The attitude of 18-34 year olds towards newspapers has been described as “alarming” (though unsuprising in my opinion).

Only 9% described newspapers as a trustworthy news source. 8% found them useful, and 4% found them “entertaining”.

In the years that followed this report, the newspaper was listed as the least preferred choice of local, national, or international news.

Furthermore, why would anyone buy a newspaper or pay for a subscription from a media conglomerate when you can get the same information from your favorite blog writers for free?

Moreover, blog writers are as, if not more informative and more independent than most traditional newspapers.

Prediction: media conglomerates will begin capitalizing on blogs.

Think about it, most (good) blog writers are already qualified writers, that already have a reader base, and they understand the benefits of internet advertising. Most bloggers have a keen knowledge of internet marketing, they know how to write informative stories that generate revenue at the same time.

I predict media conglomerates will begin paying blog writers, (probably on a cost per click basis) to do what they do already.

Obviously there are domain and ownership issues to be worked out e.g – would the previously independently owned blog fall under that media conglomerates ownership? Or will they take a share in revenue?

Still, the future of new media is exciting and nerve racking.

Hopefully news outlets will make the right decision.

Just because the pulp mill is dead, doesn’t mean that news is, or should be. On the contrary.

People are still demanding reliable news sources.

As the Y Generation – (the first generation whose internet and computer skills come as naturally as breathing) get older, the demand for reliable digital news sources will increase.

Yes, the newspaper is dead.

Great!

News outlets are finally recognising dramatic changes in reader trends (changes I might add that Rupert Murdoch pointed out over two years ago).

Newspapers and media conglomerates have discovered more than a little late that they are getting left behind – a realisation and an inevitability that economists and media owners realised over fourteen years ago!

They predicted that the wood-pulp and printing press would soon become defunct once newspapers discovered how to use the internet. Strangely that never happened, or as Rupert Murdoch put it, the newspapers spent the ensuing years “remarkably, unaccountably complacent, quietly hoping that this thing called the digital revolution would just limp along.”

I hate to point out the obvious but clinging to the past is a futile exercise, and that getting rid of one more outnumbered and outdated news medium, is the only way to ensure a successful future for the news industry.

Though there is still that tiny insignificant matter of the millions of dollars of debt “old media” have found themselves in. I wonder how many years need to go by before the old pulp mill can be considered an antique, (if it isn’t already considered to be an antique). You could sell it to an antiquarian for a mint to settle the debt.

How about this: I will give fifty bucks to the person who comes up with a solution to finance the news industry: to settle all debt, as well as coming up with a lucrative business plan for a complete overhaul of the industry that doesn’t involve government bail outs, and maintains (if not increases) the integrity of news mediums around the country, and around the world.

Fifty bucks.

Fifty bucks and – instant, infinite, internet fame .

You’ll be forever written as “the guy/girl who saved the media industry,” at least on this blog.