Decline of Newspapers Hand-Wringing

[yellowwood]

We are going through a media revolution which is affecting "the fourth estate," There is a lot of comment about what a tragedy it will be if newspapers lose some of their power and prestige. I agree, but I believe that many have sown the seeds of their own downfall.
Where was their "investigative journalism" during the run-up to the Iraq invasion? The NY Times allowed such hawks as Judith Miller to spew her poison from Ahmad Chalabi with no problem. It was from Internet sites that many of us learned what was really going on and who was cheer-leading us into the war.
The Bush Administration got away with so much incompetency and bad governance without a peep from the newspapers. So now, if we choose to get some of our information from other sources, the newspaper business should not be surprised.
They need to adjust to this new situation. Become trustworthy again.

[KharmaTrain]

1. The Real Reason For The Death Of Papers...Craigslist

News had become less and less an important function of many newspapers. News coverage is a money loser...an expense. While sensational headlines may sell some papers, most news coverage won't. More and more newspapers relied on heavy retail advertising and classified ads to fill their coffers. The retail began to fade with the rise of other advertising mediums...cable tv and internet...and when the economy turned sour, newspapers lost a good chunk of their "institutionals". Then, with the rise of internet personals, want ads began to vanish...why pay for something a website offers for free? Add to those problems the mergermania that led papers to take on huge short term debts in hopes of long term riches...and when the market bubble burst, so did those riches, but not the debts.

Newspaper credibility is tied strongly to the bottom line. If a paper feels dependent to an advertising community or other revenue source, the reporting will reflect it. The Iraq war was not just a massive sales effort of the booosh regime, but of corporate America that stood to make billions in outsourcing dollars. The market boom was another sales effort that made it appear that greed was good...and what was good for American business (including war) was good for us all. They still haven't taken account of their roles as salespeople and they never will.

Thank goodness for blogs and the internet...the filter of the corporates are now being bypassed. Let them wring their hands...they still don't get it...best they rot into oblivion.

[ThomWV]

3. KT - may I expand on one of your thoughts?

This comment you made sort of rang a bell for me: "The retail began to fade with the rise of other advertising mediums...cable tv and internet ..."

I thought to myself, well that sounds right but why? The first thing that popped into my mind was that it was simply a larger world in which they could spend their money and the profits thinned accordingly. Maybe that is a big part of it, but then this second notion stuck me. As you know I've become somewhat of a maniacal bastard when it comes to how I believe we are manipulated in our decision making process. I think the menace which began with commercial advertising but has become ubiquitous and most disturbing in the formation of public policy. Well, here is a reason to abandon print and move to visual media - it offers greater opportunity for manipulation of the audience. That makes TV and internet advertising far more valuable than print so if you add to that problem the continuing increase in cost of print then it has to fail.

Oh, the news? That has little to nothing to do with it and in evidence of that fact let me point out that shitty papers are failing just as fast as good ones.

[KharmaTrain]

4. Another Bigger Is Better Example

Thom...you definitely are on the same wavelength here...looking beyond the surface into the other factors that motivate the flow of information in our world. It's one those that are in control don't want you to see, but it's there once you strip away their PR and look at the true bottom lines.

I saw a profound change in advertising in the 80s as malls and chains began to eat away at the moms & pops and local retailers. They had the volume and thus the lower prices and they advertised heavily...specifically in papers and on regional radio and TV. As the chains began to be devoured by even larger chains, the focuse moved further from main street to the corporate suites. Advertising came from agencies and the large chains relied more on the big national accounts and walked away from both the few remaining local merchants and the community in general. The only exception was sports that was part of a different corporate marketing world.

Business has always had a hand in forming policy. For all the altruism people put on our forefathers and the Constitution, the revolution was as much a revolt of business. Many of those forefathers represented the biggest financial interests of the time and Thomas Paine and Adam Smith were surely not socialists. But that's really straying...food for another thread.

It all goes to the adage, you get what you pay for...these days since the public isn't really paying for the media, it doesn't get much in return.

Cheers...

[customerserviceguy]

5. The Internet

is the first really "accountable" way of advertising. If a bookseller runs ads in the newspaper, or on TV, they have pretty much no way of knowing if the traffic through the door came from those campaigns. Yes, they could use newspaper coupons, but most people who see the ad don't bother cutting them out and presenting them.

When you get a sale over the Internet, there is complete and total tracking about which website sent the customer there. You can perfectly target your advertising campaign to the sites that bring you the most traffic. We've never had such advertising accountability in the history of the industry. It's no wonder that dead tree editions of newspapers and magazines are dying.

[AlinPA]

2. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette will stop delivery and newstand service on April 1 for

the daily paper everywhere outside of Allegheny County.

[Odin2005]

6. The media is undergoing a revolution that will destroy the M$M.

The elites fear citizen journalism, which is why their lackeys in the MSM like to attack bloggers so much

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

7. Sirota: Newspapers’ Self-Inflicted Wounds

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20090326_newspapers_self-inflicted_wounds