Did Blogs kill newspapers?

Computerworld's Dan Tynan wonders. http://blogs.computerworld.com/blogosphere_newspapers

In the great food chain of news reporting, daily newspapers are like plankton -- the thing on which everything else feeds. TV and radio news? Aside from covering staged events or natural disasters, they get many of their stories from papers, then distill it into the bare essentials for broadcast. Magazine editors may be reluctant to admit this, but many articles are "inspired" by stories in the paper. And blogs? Don't get me started. I'd guesstimate a fraction of one percent of blogs feature original reporting; the rest regurgitate news from the mainstream media, mostly newspapers.
If daily newspapers disappeared tomorrow, 100 million bloggers would wake up and have nothing to say. Even the news aggregators would be in deep kimshee. For example, easily 75 percent of the stories on the front page of today's Drudge Report are from newspapers or the wire services that supply newspapers.

I don't think blogs, per se, killed newspapers, but I do think the Internet has.

When TV came out there was widespread belief that the new media would kill off newspapers. It didn't of course, largely because they are complementary media, really. What TV does well, newspaper can't do. But newspaper can do far more than TV can, because TV is enslaved by the need for images and, frankly, most news stories don't have good images.

On the other hand, the Internet is directly competitive to both TV and newspapers. It can do both about as well as either can, and has the advantage of being able to incorporate the best of the other medium directly into the same platform. Got great video to go with your story. Embed YouTube. Got a need to cover a word-heavy story? Internet can not just have the story, but ti can include links to primary documents.

Blogs, themselves, are just a small part of the problem. The news aggregating sites are the largest part. What they will do once the newspapers disappear is a very good question, though.

No 2009 convention for ASNE

The American Society of Newspaper Editors, citing tough times, has cancelled its annual convention.

http://www.asne.org/index.cfm?id=7268

Rocky Mountain News RIP

And the end comes for the Rocky Mounatin News: http://www.rockymountainnews.com/news/2009/feb/26/rocky-mountain-news-closes-friday-final-edition/

The paper has been moved from endangered to deceased.

A handful of newsroom staff (about 10) will ove over to the Denver Post, the rest will lose their jobs.

San Francisco Chronicle may close

Heart Corp. said it will impose big cuts on the S.F, Chronicle in an effort to stem more than $50 million in losses and will either sell the paper or close it if no buyer can be found.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2009/02/25/MNO2164F73.DTL

Hartford Courant lays off 100

And just like that, a hundred jobs are gone at The Hartford Courant: http://www.courant.com/business/hc-web-courantcuts0225,0,7696606.story

And another bankruptcy

This time in Philadelphia: http://www.philly.com/philly/hp/news_update/20090222_Inquirer_owner_files_for_bankruptcy.html

Perhaps less dire than JRC, this one is mostly about debt.

And there goes JRC

Journal Register Corp. has filed for bankruptcy.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iuX8HrEMBhwkQH2BzYHwkKN7mVTgD96GAE6O1

What will emerge from the wreckage is hard to say. The company owns some 20 dailies and more than a 100 weeklies, so no doubt there's something of value buried in there.

Given that JRC is, arguably, the absolute worst of the newspaper chains that emerged from the chain era, I can't say I am sorry to see it go. The AP story mentions that the company's stock was recently trading at less than a penny, down from more than $20 a few years ago.

As the entire purpose of the chain was to suck as much profit out of local communities while returning the bare minimum in journalistic service, expect there to be no tears shed among journalists over the demise of the operation. Yes, I know that this is a "reorganization" bankruptcy, but the chain will not emerge from this reorganization intact or with the same management.

Scripps cuts pay

The Scripps chain will cut pay by more than 3 percent, and emplyees will go ahead and take it, I'm sure.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/20/business/media/20scripps.html?_r=1&ref=business

And still more furloughs

It's a regular epidemic. This time it's Media General.

http://www.bizjournals.com/tampabay/stories/2009/02/16/daily41.html

A former Gannett employee runs a blog keeping tabs on that chain

Here's the link: http://gannettblog.blogspot.com/

Gannett has a bad reputation among the rank-and-file even among media chains. It's not rock bottom, however, that honor undoubtedly belongs to JRC.

Another daily drops a couple of days

Kane County (Ill.) paper drops Monday and combines Sunday and Saturday into a weekend edition coming out Saturday.

http://www.kcchronicle.com/articles/2009/02/16/04732986/index.xml

More furloughs, this time in Kansas and Missouri

NPG Newspaper's give 390 employees a week "off."

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003941981

Another "daily" drops a day

This time in Idaho Falls: http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003941774

So how do you make information worth paying for?

Interesting debate over how to save newspapers here: http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5hm-NaXE47tuN1DQKXQlgBaYJpNJA

The reality is that there needs to be some way to make providing information economically viable to do.

Personally I think any model that depends on consumers paying is not viable given current technologies. We're seeing the same problem play out in other media such as music and book publishing. All these were created during an era when technology required physical media that was impossible to copy by the individual user and therefore it was possible to control distribution by limiting access to the physical media represented by the book or record/LP/8-Track/cassette/CD. Newspapers and magazines, ironically, were less wedded to this model, generally only charging the consumer for the cost of the paper and generating most income from advertisers.

Given that information can't be held in by the current bounds of technology I think it's a losing strategy to expect consumers to pay for content at any price that would be economically viable.

On the other hand. advertisers still need to get attention and in an environment where it gets harder and harder to be noticed. What will have to change, I think, it's the expectation that advertising dollars will support the huge infrastructure of current media companies. Most of the people employed at a newspaper or magazine don't produce content.

Indeed, at a newspaper with a couple hundred employees, only a few dozen work in the newsroom and around the same work in advertising. The news media of the future will be much leaner and meaner. There will still need to be reporters, editors and ad reps but the whole printing and circulation operation will have to go, along with comparable reductions in the support staff needed.

"Never?" That's definitely "deferred" compensation

Bankruptcy judge OKs the Chicago Tribune's plan to stop paying deferred comp and change severance policies.

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/departments/business/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003937485

Different ways to skin the cat

Stephens Media, which publishes a dozen dailies, has suspended its 401 (k) matching program.

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/departments/business/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003941054

Better than furloughs and layoffs, perhaps, but still money out of pockets.

And 401 (k) are better than pensions because ... ?

Fargo Forum lays off 21 employees

The Forum daily newspaper of Fargo (ND) reports laying off 21 employees. The paper says it has about 240 FTE employees.

Details: http://www.inforum.com/event/article/id/230672

JRC closes 8 weeklies

Troubled media giant Journal Register is closing 8 weekly papers in New York.

http://www.recordonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090210/NEWS/90210041

More furloughs

This time New England Newspapers, which publishes the Berkshire Eagle, among others. bout 300 jobs, the Boston Globe reports.

http://www.boston.com/business/ticker/2009/02/new_england_new.html

Loan defaults in McClatchy's future?

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003939434

Probably the biggest obstacle for most of the industry surviving this downturn is the excessive debt a lot of operations are burdened with.

It doesn't get as much attention as the home loan crisis or the the excessive credit card debt most households have, but there was a lot of speculation and excessive indebtedness in commercial real estate and in the media business over the last few years. Quite a few media chains changed hands at very high prices, apparently on the theory that newspapers were a license to print money -- a theory that had a lot of evidence going for it until very recently, too.

But, like housing, there have been signs for a long time that the fundamentals of the industry were unsound. Things changed fast.

AP reports more furloughs at papers in Texas and New Mexico

Details here from the Editor & Publisher site:

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003939483

This doesn't look good at at all

A chart tracking monthly job loesses in each of thelast three downturns. Blue is 1990, red is 2001 and green is the current difficulty.

Union workers take furloughs

Workers at the St. Paul Pioneer Press agreed to take five unpaid days off as part of a furlough plan.

http://www.bizjournals.com/twincities/stories/2009/02/02/daily59.html

Also, union pressman at The Day in New London, CT, also agreed to take 1-week furloughs. Non union employees elsewhere in the company are already taking furlough between now and July.

Layoff at Sarasota Florida paper

48 more jobs gone and a shrinking circulation area, too.

http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20090204/ARTICLE/902040335/2107/BUSINESS?Title=Herald_Tribune_cuts_jobs_and_some_home_delivery

Hearst shows no interest in Seattle

P-I owner Hearst is not only putting the P-I up for sale with a short deadline, it's also NOT making a $1 million annual payment that gives it first refusal rights to the Seattle Times, so it seems that they don't have any plans to merge the two.

A local group trying to put together a deal for the P-I demanded to know if Hearst made the payment. I presume they needed to make sure the way was clear in order to line up financing.

http://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/stories/2009/02/02/daily21.html

Interesting proposal from Rutten

Making a grand bargain to create a paying model for content in a digital age:

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/sunday/la-oe-rutten4-2009feb04,1,4979706.column

Three more papers drop a day

Accoridng to Business Week, three Ohio papers have stopped publishing one day a week, in this case Tuesdays.

http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D96490600.htm

Can someone come up with the cash needed to buy the P-I

It's not looking too promising.

http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/stories/2009/02/02/daily21.html

With just six weeks left to do a deal, there's little indication anyone with the deep pockets needed is interested in stepping forward.

Bill Keller predicts that the law of supply and demand will kick in

The New York Times' Bill Keller sees a declining supply of quality journalism even as the demand for it increases and predicts that the logic of the marketplace will eventually mean that a way will be found for the market to pay for it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/business/media/02askthetimes.html?hp=&pagewanted=all

I agree, although that does not necessarily mean that newspapers will benefit. It's at least as likely some new business model created by new companies will crack the code and find out how to make reporting profitable.

While I think print newspapers are doomed, I don't think journalism is.

Blaming the messenger

These folks should know better, too.

Newspaper execs complain about all the "doom and gloom" reporting about the future of newspapers.

The fact they are complaining about the coverage is telling.

http://news.newspaperproject.org/

Norwich (CT) Bulletin cuts printing jobs

The Norwich (CT) Bulletin has outsourced its printing operations, eliminating about two dozen jobs.