A Seattle newspaper, whose future is in doubt due to the possible demise of its joint operating agreement with the other Seattle newspaper, ran a long column last week by a young reporter who proudly proclaimed that she does not read newspapers.
Perhaps this was the Post-Intelligencer’s unofficial white flag for the print edition, and/or giving notice it plans to be an online-only newspaper if the joint operating agreement ends.
The reporter who doesn’t read newspapers assumes the sooner-than-later eventual death of all print newspapers. We think not. We like newspapers. We like Web sites, too. They are not mutually exclusive.
Such vogue, dire, short-sighted predictions are getting old. Yes, circulation of newspapers’ print editions is down from its heyday; just as viewership of network TV is down from the years when those channels were the only show in town. (Yet network TV somehow still lives). And newspapers still make money, or they would be dead already.
Naysayers insist newspapers must eventually be replaced by Web sites. Why? Many magazines today are thriving, from the national to the niche. Many, many of them have Web sites. Why is no one wringing hands about the imminent death of magazines? When the Internet first began, people fearfully predicted that competition from the Web would put “brick and mortar” retailers out of business. Didn’t happen. Rather, businesses have found that Web sites, and catalogues, work well in tandem to support and complement their “brick and mortar” operations. More options, it turns out, create more business.
Radio was supposed to bring an end to reading, TV was supposed to wipe out radio, cable was supposed to kill the networks, movie rentals were supposed to end attendance at the theaters, etc. We still have all those things. People are interested in having more “multimedia” choices, not fewer.
The young reporter, speaking for journalists, writes, “In print, a story reaches a doorstep and stops. Online, it’s picked up, linked up, Googled, blogged, praised, panned, quoted, noted and gratefully shared. In a word, it lives.” (Well, to be picky, “it lives” is actually two words.)
Since the reporter doesn’t read newspapers, she apparently doesn’t know that the paper is then picked up off the doorstep, read, shared, saved, etc. What’s wrong with the newspaper being the origin of many stories that end up online … kind of like how it is now? Also, let’s not lose sight that newspapers, and their Web sites, are for the readers, and would-be readers. They don’t care so much whether a journalist’s work continues to “live” online, or in a scrapbook, or at all. You can’t line a birdcage with a laptop, but a printout will do.
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