Under Weight of Its Mistakes, Newspaper Industry Staggers

Washington Post ^ | March 1, 2009 | Howard Kurtz

[Zakeet]

Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper recalls getting "a feeling in the pit of my stomach" when he learned that the Rocky Mountain News was shutting down. "Even when they were uncovering corruption in the city, even when they were embarrassing us or causing us discomfort, they were making the city better," he says. "It's a huge loss."

The grim echoes of the nearly 150-year-old paper's demise Friday could be heard in newsrooms and communities across the country. Although the Denver Post will still cover Hickenlooper's region, some cities -- most notably San Francisco -- are facing the prospect of life without a major newspaper. Others, from Philadelphia to Chicago to Minneapolis, have watched their papers slide into bankruptcy, while still others are being served by dailies with newsrooms that have shriveled by half.

Why a once-profitable industry suddenly seems as outmoded as America's automakers is a tale that involves arrogance, mistakes, eroding trust and the rise of a digital world in which newspapers feel compelled to give away their content.

"Most of the wounds are self-inflicted," says Phil Bronstein, editor at large of the San Francisco Chronicle, which Hearst Corp. has threatened to close unless major cost savings are achieved or a buyer is found. Rather than engage the audience, he says, "the public was seen as kind of messy and icky and not something you needed to get involved with."

[Zakeet]

Among other general problems listed in the article:

• Newspapers were cash cows when they should have been busy building their brand

• Younger people lack emotional attachment to their newspapers.

• Partisans on the left and the right call the coverage biased.

• Newspapers must (but cannot) find a way to charge for online content.

• Newspapers must go the nonprofit route, relying on donors to raise endowments, much like universities.

• Newspapers are killing sections and closing bureaus, particularly in Washington.

• On Friday, the American Society of Newspaper Editors canceled its convention, saying too many members planned to stay home.

Among other specific problems listed in the article:

• The Detroit News and the Detroit Free Press cut home delivery to three days a week.

• The Washington Times dropped its Saturday print edition.

• The Christian Science Monitor is switching to Web-only publication in April.

• USA Today, is forcing staffers to take a week-long furlough.

• Hearst plans to close the Seattle Post-Intelligencer unless it gets a buyer.

• The New York Times has borrowed $250 million from a Mexican financier at 14 percent interest, eliminated its quarterly dividend last month to conserve cash and folded its Metro section into the paper.

• Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. has taken a roughly $3 billion write-down on the value of its newspaper unit, which includes the New York Post..

• The Washington Post, whose earnings dropped 77 percent in the fourth quarter of last year, has undergone three rounds of buyouts, killed its Sunday Source section and folded Book World as a separate section.

[Titus Quinctius Cincinnatus]

"It's a huge loss."

If you say so, Mayor.

[silverleaf]

the partisans (on both sides) who accuse the newspapers of “right wing bias” must be celebrating, for sure.

Just think of all that “right wing” “news” that won’t be distributed...and all those “right wing” editorials that won’t be read....

LOL!!!

[The Spirit Of Allegiance]

SOME MISTAKES:

KEYWORDS: biasmeanslayoffs; deadtreemedia; trysellingthetruth;

[behzinlea]

Put stakes in their hearts.

[OnTheDress]

I had a greater loss about 20 minutes ago, but I was reading an old Playboy.

[IbJensen]

Think of all the trees that will now be spared.

[scooby321]

People just are not buying what they are selling.

[kjo]

Is it not amazing how these papers will go out of business rather than attend to their bias?

They will die before giving conservatives a fair voice.

Just amazing.

[cookcounty]

"People just are not buying what they are selling."

Even putatively "right-of-center" newspapers, like the Rocky, have their "news: sections jammed with hard left editorialization. Which makes for an unpleasant (to say the least) experience.

No editor that I've heard of, has made any attempt to address this.

[central_va]

This is the best explanation of liberal media bias: If everyone speaks with same accent(liberal) then that becomes the norm. The hick accent(conservative) sticks out and is abnormal.

[Da Coyote]

“...Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper recalls getting “a feeling in the pit of my stomach...”

The Looper (apt name in these days of the Obamaloon administration) won’t have anyone to defend - among other things - the multi-million dollar effort to build housing for the homeless, expanding Denver’s sanctuary city status, and keeping all those illegal felons out of jail.

This guy is a looser of Obama-like proportions.

[behzinlea]

People have other options. The days are past when papers could force feed their liberal pablum (disguised as news) to a public that had few other outlets for finding out in depth what is going in the world and their communities. Where I live, the pre-World War II generation makes up a significant portion of the subscription base of the local papers. The dirty little secret is that many of them would not subscribe but for the obituary section. As that generation dies, the papers tend to die with them.

[pointsal]

Did all of the city of Denver’s bills from the convention get paid? How many public dollars got spent?

[MuttTheHoople]

Newspapers are going the way of town criers and home milk delivery.

[hinckley buzzard]

They really are clueless. I especially liked the quotes from "experts" at the J-schools. They live in a comic book world where the Daily Planet rules and Perry White still holds court, and Superman flies outside the window.

The daily paper is the latest buggy whip. It came into being on the strength of having monopoly access to scarce information. Now information is available in excess for free. The future of the newspaper is local and maybe regional news. That's all.

[sweet_diane]

"Younger people lack emotional attachment to their newspapers."

While I would not be considered 'younger' by most, I am by my mom. It absolutely drives her crazy that we don't take the local paper! Instead we get our national and local news from "that damn computer" and by watching the local TV news.

I cracked up just the other day. Mom was, once again, complaining that we don't take the paper and a few minutes later, she was complaining about having to clean newsprint off her A/C thermostat! lol

[PSYCHO-FREEP]

Parakeets and Canaries across the nation are very sad indeed. But then, when a subscription to one of these Liberal rags costs from 150 to 180 dollars per year and the obsolete issue winds up in a landfill, it makes sense.

Like the changes in technology that drive public markets, the 8-track tape players wound up replaced by a better form of media. Tradition or not, there are certain laws that determine the trends and this is one of them.

[perez24]

We get the local newspaper for local news, events, and coupons, and the Washington Times for its editorials and Redskins coverage. However, by the time I get home from work it’s all old news. I can surf FR and other sites during the day to get the latest news or listen to the radio.

Newspapers have almost become a waste of time.

[CarolTX]

Another Specific problem:

A few months ago, the Austin American-Statesman stopped publishing the television listings for the week in its Sunday edition. The paper said (in effect) “everybody can find the times of their favorite shows on-line.”

Well, duh...
1. Not everyone has daily internet access.
2. Not everyone 50+ has the internet AT ALL or is comfortable using it. (this is the same demo most likely to be faithful to TV watching and having a newspaper subscription)
3. Speaking of “comfort”, I think it is a royal !$#@* to find daily listings online...something that isn’t skewed to a particular network...something that has show or movie summaries. I also want in a one-sheet format showing MY LOCAL cable channel numbers...something I can print out and have with me by the remote. Impossible.
4. Assume you got your favorite shows tracked...uh, how about new shows, specials, or a movie on TCM? I’ve missed out on so many things lately it makes me furious. What’s the point in having all these cable channels if you can’t find an interesting program without speed-zapping the remote every half-hour?

The TV section was the last reason I kept my subscription. When it went, so did I, and so did a lot of my friends. Suprise! Typical case of ignoring your audience.

[ecomcon]

..she was complaining about having to clean newsprint off her A/C thermostat!

I'm sure there is a connection, but I just can't think of one.

[digger48]

However, by the time I get home from work it’s all old news. I can surf FR and other sites during the day to get the latest news or listen to the radio.

By the time it hits actual ink on paper, I can't even recognize some of the news stories that had already been available on the internet for hours and sometimes days.

[chainsaw]

They will die before giving conservatives a fair voice.

Correction: They will die before printing the truth for all to see.

[org.whodat]

Trying to find one tear, no luck yet?

[Waco]

With the rise of the internet and their inability to stay away from socialist/communism, there’s no way to go but down. Comics and crosswords can’t save em.

[Old North State]

I think that a lot of newspaper people have been embedded with the political left for so long they are now incapable of recognizing what has happened to them. They still see the change in race relations of the last fifty years as a consequence of the a heroic fight they they themselves led. They can't let go of it so what we get is ‘all race, all the time’. I think an enormous number of people who moved on from segregation long ago are sick of the race issue being injected into every story. The same goes for politics. Watergate was the high point for a lot of reporters who decided they want to change the world instead of reporting the facts. Liberal by nature, reporters bought into the ‘Democrats good, Republicans bad’ storyline and never let go. Now they don't even remember a time when they were objective, when newspapers were a source of news and not commentary thinly disguised as news. Sad, really.

[GBA]

It is easy to blame the internet and other means to convey the news, but it is the lack of journalism that is killing newspapers and network news.

Quality journalism will never go out of style, regardless of the medium used to convey it and there will always be a market for reliable news reporting and the newspaper.

If high quality reporting should someday return to the newspapers or to network newscasts, they will be rewarded. Until then, people naturally seek other sources. Fortunately, such sources still exist.

[STONEWALLS]

.....the Post is largely responsible for this...they’re the origional anti-American scandal sheet....I remember their vicious attacks on Eisenhower in the late 50s....really disgusting....the only reason they’re in better shape than most is they bought Kaplan and some TV stations that make money.

[Feckless]

Can’t wait for the Waco Trib and Austin Un-American Stasi to follow.....

[Oldpuppymax]

A great many of those actually bright and interested enough to want to read a newspaper are sick to death of the left-wing bias. There. The mystery has been solved.

[abb]

ping

[abb]

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-onthemedia1-2009mar01,0,4383071.column

Chronicle befits San Francisco
The 144-year-old Chronicle is a ‘quirky’ newspaper for a ‘quirky’ city.

[Drango]

buggy whip manufactures will soon demand a bailout.

[Grampa Dave]

"Is it not amazing how these papers will go out of business rather than attend to their bias?

They will die before giving conservatives a fair voice."

Their core belief: "Better Red and Dead, instead of Read!" and their arrogance are making the dinosaur fish wraps more irrelevant and terminal each day.

[Let's Roll]

That’s exactly right. Libs aren’t just being stubborn or malicious when they insist that their screeds are unbiased. Because of the milieu they live in they actually see their propaganda as mainstream, middle of the road etc.

That’s why it’s a waste of time trying to get them to come right. We need our own widely distributed conservative media.

[Bernard Marx]

I especially liked the quotes from "experts" at the J-schools. They live in a comic book world where the Daily Planet rules and Perry White still holds court, and Superman flies outside the window.

Not at all. They are masters of propaganda and mass manipulation. I have some experience with that and the Marxist proclivities of such "experts" have a lot to do with the demise of newspapers. Brainwashed J-school grads who see "social justice" and the Environment as their callings have replaced down-to-earth crusading editors and reporters of old. These people no longer even understand or care about the principles our country was founded on.

[Reeses]

What makes FR so fun is having a mainstream left-biased article put up and then tearing it to shreds. With the demise of the Comicle we lose some of our amusement.

[Liz]

.........their arrogance are making the dinosaur fish wraps more irrelevant and terminal each day.........

Thanks. I needed some good news.

[blu]

Today, after Mass, I went to our local Walgreen's to get the paper. They no longer carry the local rag. Seems the paper wants to be paid once a week, and Walgreens pays at 90 days, so the local geniuses decided to pull their paper!

As the check-out guy and another customer and I decided the Wretched Beagle is one stupid paper indeed (they raised their prices and subscriptions went down...who’da thunk??). I told them that there just aren't enough bird cages in our county...

We only buy it on Sundays for the ads and obits. Which, yes, I could get online..but there's just something about sitting at the kitchen table with some coffee and the paper on Sunday.

[BOBTHENAILER]

dinosaur fish wraps more irrelevant and terminal each day.

I have this old, warm, vision in mind. Remember the old commercial or whatever, that showed the young kid, shouting "Read All About It", while hawking street side newspapers?

I have that same vision in mind now, with your headline being the bold print on front.

DEAD DINOSAUR FISH WRAP'S LAST EDITION

and the poor kid being soon out of work now shouting "Git yer Last Edition Now".

[Grampa Dave]

More good news from the leftwing coast.

4 of the major left wing “Better read and dead, than read” fishwraps might not last this year:

1. LA Slimes
2. Frisco GayRhonicle
3. Sacramento Bee
4. Seattle Times

Not only will the West Coast population be better off, so will the nation if these lying/biased fishwraps take a permanent dirt nap.

[McGavin999]

There are none so blind as those who WILL NOT see.

[Grampa Dave]

We need the help of our graphic artist to make your dream into a work of art:

” have that same vision in mind now, with your headline being the bold print on front.

DEAD DINOSAUR FISH WRAP’S LAST EDITION

and the poor kid being soon out of work now shouting “Git yer Last Edition Now”.

[ken5050]

What Kurtz fails to mentiuon is that if the Grahams hadn’t bought Kaplan a while back..the WP would have folded a long time ago..Indeed..stockholders would be better served if they spun off the WP..except it couldn’t stand alone..

[Miss Marple]

You know, for most of them they can't produce unbiased national stories because they use the AP for those stories, and we all know how bad the AP is; their only other choices as far as I know are either Reuters or the New York Times news service, which are even worse.

If they want to produce unbiased stories they would either have to get their own reporter to Washington or get content from their own observations on C-SPAN or maybe work out a deal with the Washington Examiner or someone like that.

I can think of lots of things they could do to improve circulation, but I don't want to bore everyone with my opinions on that. The main thing is that they don't know their customers, they don't understand business, and they have no creativity in putting something out which would catch people's attention.

[Marie2]

“.but there’s just something about sitting at the kitchen table with some coffee and the paper on Sunday. “

Yes, it’s the difference between a book and a Kindle. I’ve actually never tried a Kindle, but I don’t even want to. I like a book in my hands.

I haven’t subscribed to the paper in years, but I wish there was a good, reasonably priced one that I could subscribe to.

[Grampa Dave]

They stopped their reporters from reporting on the news what was really happening decades ago.

Their hacks were sent out with a biased agenda to create story to show how bad and evil we are and how great their lefties were/are.

Some of the hacks got so good at lying, like Jayson Blair, they stopped going out to interview people. They stayed in hotel rooms, got drunk, drugged and created pure lies posing as stories, until they got exposed on the internet.

Which is why the editors like the AP lies and biases. They don’t have to pick up the bills of their own liars. They just print the AP bias like how the Israelis are killing innocent Arabs or how evil Governor Palin is.

[EVO X]

I haven’t subscribed to the paper in years, but I wish there was a good, reasonably priced one that I could subscribe to.

You could call them up and ask them. Some cash flow is better than no cash flow. I pay $10 a month plus a couple of bucks tip. And the paper is still mostly conservative..

[Liz]

4 of the major left-wing newsies going down———

Happy days are here again.

[RayChuang88]

However, you can substitute a paper with a Netbook computer, especially now with many homes having access to a broadband connection.

Since Wi-Fi wireless routers (if you don't need 802.11n support) are dirt-cheap nowadays, you can set up a wireless router and configure a wireless connection with most Netbook computers that can be placed anywhere nearby. That way, you can read the news on a web browser in that little computer.