Thursday, January 1, 2009

Empires crumble

David Crisp, formerly of Victoria, now of Montana, has a nice essay on the state of the newspaper biz in his Outpost. In part
How bad is it? Between March and September, circulation in America’s top 500 newspapers fell 4.6 percent. The Los Angeles Times has lost about a quarter of its circulation so far in this young century. The Christian Science Monitor has become a web publication. The Detroit News and the Detroit Free Press have cut home delivery to three days a week. Layoffs are happening everywhere.

Read all here. One of the G&D journalism sites I frequent notes that the average newspaper reader is 56 years old. Has it occurred to any publisher that a person that age likely has 20 or 25 years of life left? Instead of trying to make newspapers appeal to a generation that is not equipped to read, why don't the papers try to please the hard-core readers and accept a certain loss of the bales of money that used to roll in? The effort to make newspapers more pleasing to a visually oriented young crowd leaves papers looking like middle-school social science textbooks. I really don't need a photo of a stack of $100 bills to help me understand a finance article, nor a pie chart to show me that in an election that broke 50-50, each candidate pretty much got half the vote. Art that helps is helpful, but in newspapers, art for art's sake is a loser and space-waster. Noticed today that in some Vicad story the writer talked about someone having a 'conscious,' a painful error.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Aw hell, can't remember my stinkin Google identy......so pilot posting as anon will have to do. If the article was referring to some of those proofing what goes into the paper....then maybe they were actually having a "conscious" moment....and the writer noticed that as out of the ordinary. I read it because it's the hometown rag......but I'll be the first to admit it's a small town pub and it shows. When editorial comments about a shooting at a low rent titty bar start with testimonials from patrons, then evolve to the local Baptists assailing such a place, then the shooting victim chimes in from his laptop in his hospital bed, you know you are reading an outback daily.....

Anonymous said...

Even worse, in the Jan 3 edition, -a guy was "conscience" when he arrived at the hospital after being shot in the leg- that's our vicad.

The Loon said...

anon2: yeah, I did a little squeal of malevolent glee when I read that. Poor Advocate.
anon1 [aka pilot]: I'm eternally entertained by the exchanges of evil wishes on the discussions section. It's seems to be something like nine people exchanging snark. Poor Advocate.

Sugar Magnolia said...

Well said, Mr. Loon. Fercryin out loud, you WOULD think the older demographic would be more important. It is my firm belief that there are some kids out there that have never even picked up a newspaper, unless required to do so by some oh-so-evil teacher in school. I fear more and more these days we are the last of a dying breed. Just the other day I had a small tiff with the Houston Chronicle over a delivery issue, and this is the first time I can remember being treated shabbily. I think that this is NOT the time for newspapers to alienate ANY paying customers. I have read the Chronicle all my life, and the Post when it was still around; they were likely the first things I EVER read. Now, I am sad to say, the Chronicle is clinging by a thread to my loyalty. If a lifelong reader such as myself can be irked by a beloved paper to the point of considering canceling her subscription, well, my advice to ALL publications is to please its paying readers....or else.