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143 Comments
- kylescousin, on 09/24/2009, -22/+89Hopefully paper newspapers will be complete history one day... What a waste of paper and space.
- socivitus, on 09/24/2009, -2/+66Video killed the radio star.
But we still need the radio and we still listen to it. - Awwzm, on 09/24/2009, -0/+37Let's hope they figure out how to generate revenue without charging for online access.
- MacBookForMe, on 09/24/2009, -2/+39yet, so cool a smell and sound when browsing through one...
- Floyder, on 09/24/2009, -0/+23Newspapers are not dead, they're experiencing a paradigm shift. The functional purpose of the newspaper is to provide news and that demand has not only gone down, it's shot up. The problem is adapting to the new medium which is the Internet and coming up with a viable business plan. As much as there are blogs and tweets out there, the majority are crap and the percentage of people who can write well and investigate well has remained the same so these people can still work as journalists, but their work would be published online instead of in print.
- LouisCipher777, on 09/24/2009, -2/+21it's no surprise that of all of them only the WSJ has seen positive change in readership.
- EddiePotato, on 09/24/2009, -1/+19The form factor of newspapers has always kind of put me off, personally. They're big and awkward, and the pages tend to slide around, making it difficult to refold once your arms have gone to sleep from holding it up. Plus all that "turn to page D7 if you want to read the rest" crap, making you perform origami on the thing just to finish an article.
Could never figure out why all the major papers didn't publish in magazine form; all it takes is a different layout and a couple staples. I guess the world will never know. - inactive, on 09/24/2009, -1/+18This makes me so sad. I've always enjoyed reading the paper in the morning with my coffee. I think we'll always have them, just not in the same quantities that they used to publish in the past.
- Foggles, on 09/24/2009, -2/+16It's a shame that newspapers don't have online piracy as a scapegoat like the RIAA. They actually have to be held accountable for not keeping up with the times.
- chadsmith729, on 09/24/2009, -2/+15Look at the only one who has added to it's readership. The Wall Street Journal. Why? Partially because they offer great reports and insight into the crazy economic world we are living in. Keep up the great work and I love my subscription with you guys.
- EddiePotato, on 09/24/2009, -0/+13And guess how radio pays the bills? 100% ads (except NPR, satellite, etc).
Newspapers are suffering the same growing pains as the health insurance industry: inefficiencies in the system allowed them to stay fat and happy, but the inefficiencies they relied on are disappearing, making them work harder for their cash. It happens to most industries eventually, as technological and social progress antiquates old methods of producing goods and services. - dataset, on 09/24/2009, -0/+11Good night, sweet prints.
- socivitus, on 09/24/2009, -7/+18It is in no way a waste, it's still a needed medium for receiving news. I'll agree that the party is over though and the failing businesses need to restructure instead of just throwing in the towel.
- 4NDr01D, on 09/24/2009, -6/+16I was in a huge argument with a local newspaper editor one evening
I told him the future is the web because it is
Searchable
Archived
Backed up across Networks
Faster
Personalized
Free (servers are cheaper than printing presses)
Editble
Community driven
User Generated
User Comments
More Information than in all of Human History at your fingertips
***** you OLD MEDIA
you had your day in the sun - Crimeodial, on 09/24/2009, -4/+13ragg, this thread isn't about politics, and only bitter right wingers call Obama "the great one."
- evilunleashed, on 09/24/2009, -3/+11Dr. Egon Spengler predicted it in 1984. "Print is dead."
*always takes advantage of an opportunity to reference Ghostbusters* - CaptCarrot, on 09/24/2009, -0/+7Ten years from now, birdcages will be lined with old Kindles and iPhones.
- eSentrik, on 09/24/2009, -0/+7The world still needs reporters. Isn't this just bad news for paper and ink companies?
Newspapers are important for local news too - cant find that online. - deev, on 09/24/2009, -0/+7When newspapers have gone completely ... what do I put on the floor before doing something messy?
THINK OF THE FLOORS! - allothersnsused, on 09/24/2009, -1/+7I'll be sad to see newspapers go. But not sad enough to subscribe to one.
- warchant, on 09/24/2009, -0/+6this is THE biggest issue facing newspapers. i work on the web side of a newspaper. you'd be surprised at how many newspapers are considering moving over to a pay method...and how soon that could possibly happen.
if newspapers die, newspaper revenue will still have to come from somewhere...and i can promise you it's not coming from advertising. - bettverboten, on 09/24/2009, -8/+14A few, do have a chance to survive...if they just start telling the truth!
- tinkafoo, on 09/24/2009, -0/+6Way to go, Internet. I hope you're proud of yourself.
- inactive, on 09/24/2009, -2/+8Yeah, becausse newspapers are made with wood from old growth forests!
Again....getting rid of most commercial paper industries would result in FEWER trees on this planet. Not more. Newspapers are made with wood that is harvested from tree farms designed specifically for the production of paper for newspapers. They are fast growth trees and hte "forests" are there as a business decision.
If the demand for this paper drops, especially to zero, then the people who own the land where these trees are will NOT simple say "Well, that's life! I will absord this hit and just let these thousand and thousands of acres go to waste. What they will do is sell that landto the first developer that offers him a fair price. That developer might want to build a new housing development. (Not so bad...at least some trees will survive, and housing developments are not so bad environmentally.) Or, he might want o build a giant Outlet Center and chop down every last mother ***** tree he sees! - 4NDr01D, on 09/24/2009, -1/+7I'll tell you from the Content industry for Mobile Phones
is that Subscription plans DONT WORK!
put some ad's on your site
offer expert advice
and write insightful hardhitting well researched articles
keep it FREE with an RSS feed
and I'll happily click on your ad links... - MScrip, on 09/24/2009, -0/+5Just imagine if newspapers were online *first* and then someone had the bright idea to print all of yesterday's news and ship a bundle of paper to every house in the country... EVERY DAY.
It's concepts like that that make me wonder how long newspapers will be around.
I'm 32 and I will never subscribe to a newspaper. I can't imagine anyone younger than me being a newspaper subscriber in the future either.
You can already get PDFs of every Best Buy ad and other stores' ads from their websites... and when people get more accustomed to online coupons... newspapers can be eliminated for a majority of people.
"News" can be found from a variety of sources online... next, we need to stop printing phonebooks!!! - mysweetieiscute, on 09/24/2009, -0/+5I like reading
- gnixon70, on 09/24/2009, -0/+5Throwing up a paywall for newspaper content would be a huge mistake.
- indyGuy, on 09/24/2009, -1/+5I'm not saying online access should COST READERS. But it does cost content publishers - the papers.
Say cheaper instead of free, and you're good. - EddiePotato, on 09/24/2009, -2/+6William Shatner?
- trespasser28, on 09/24/2009, -0/+4My bad. The world makes sense again now.
- chadsmith729, on 09/24/2009, -0/+4Personally I would rather read quality articles that affect my life and my wallet than just a bunch of fluff articles about Mrs. May's cat being stuck in a tree for an hour.
- eviltandem, on 09/24/2009, -0/+4I am actually very curious about this (and since you work for one).
Why will advertisers pay for space on a page in the real world and not in the virtual one? This is the thing that I can't figure out. Newspapers were fine - if anything ads can be better now. They can have color, animation, and even be targeted to the user.
Why is that not viable coming from the old model? They used to pay for ads that didn't move, weren't targeted, and they got no meaningful feedback from. I did some work at a newspaper (long ago now) and the money you paid for your subscription didn't even cover the gas required to drive it to your house. It was merely there to try to asure the advertiser that people were in fact reading their newspapers (since they paid for it).
It seems like every aspect of the business would be better... so what gives? - diggerado, on 09/24/2009, -3/+7Yup. Couldn't agree more. I hate the damn things littering my lawn, taking up space in my house. I prefer news I can search for and link from thank you.
- IllBeBack, on 09/24/2009, -1/+5Go to Burger King and try ordering a Big Mac and see what you get.
- mccune, on 09/24/2009, -0/+4No, you read the graph wrong. Those were 2 of the 3 newspapers that lost the largest percentage of their circulation among the top 25.
- algaeturd, on 09/24/2009, -9/+13@raggsat98
Yet even more evidence that the right are allergic to information and reading, gathering their own sources for news than tuning out and turning on Fox News.
If it doesn't go directly into your ears, and it ain't from Fox, it isn't news....amiright?
Seriously. The 'liberal' media doesn't exist. Just because most news sources and publications are put out by people with educations doesn't mean that they cater to one side.
Admit it...you're against anything that educates people...libraries, schools, etc. The dumber people become, the more liable they are to become a member of the republican party. - Retsam06, on 09/24/2009, -0/+4You may, but most people won't. It's been studies by the newspapers. Most people skim over anything that looks remotely like an ad.
- Trister0, on 09/24/2009, -0/+3Yeah, because its biased garbage. They had to have an initiative to be more balanced and get 2 conservative columns. Too little too late. What ever happened to reporting the news instead of pushing your personal agenda?
- inactive, on 09/24/2009, -1/+4What is whth the $? IT is bad enough when it is done with Microsoft. But you can't just go around substituting a $ for every S you come across. That would be anarchy.
- TinyE500, on 09/24/2009, -2/+5I hate seeing these graphs that are plotted to exaggerate the point that the author is trying to make. Some of these are ridiculous. One quantitative graph doesn't start at zero and has equidistant increments of 25-50-70. Another has the space under the line shaded in to make it seem like there is a dropoff to $0B at 2009.
Plot your graphs correctly and let the reader decide what to make of it. - eviltandem, on 09/24/2009, -0/+3The same people who actually responded to newspaper ads?
My parents still get the newspaper - but I don't remember a single time where we ever did or bought something based on an ad we saw in the newspaper. Why would online be different? - Hetman, on 09/24/2009, -0/+3They have cut back though. There paper is not as big as it used to be.
- GeoffPeterson, on 09/24/2009, -1/+4Still subscribe to two newspapers, Post-Gazette here in Pittsburgh and the Wall Street Journal. It's hard to imagine all newspapers not moving over to digital format very soon. I'll actually miss getting them. Something about the experience you can't get online.
- IllBeBack, on 09/24/2009, -0/+3They should just start huge marijuana grow farms then. And watch their profits skyrocket.
- eviltandem, on 09/25/2009, -0/+3I'm with solid12345 on this.
I'm not at all clear why animation, high quality color, targeting, and tracking have made newspaper adverts no longer possible. If anything I would expect the opposite - the "product" has gotten dramatically better.
It just says to me that what was happening before was nobody had metrics to realize how poor the "conversion" rate for a newspaper ad was. If all the features of a product get dramatically better - but suddenly nobody can make money using it - did you really ever have a viable business model?
Seems like the whole thing was a bit like Wizard of Oz. These large organizations that were using ads to pay for everything was really all wiped away with 1 look behind the curtains? - geodebug, on 09/25/2009, -0/+3@Vestar You may have some valid points but you come off as a boorish d-bag the way you present them. Next time leave out the personal jabs and just present your counter-points in a civil manner. Skewer the ideas not the people presenting them and you'll be taken more seriously.
- inactive, on 09/24/2009, -1/+4Problem with online advertising is industry very much undervalues it. It can cost millions to get an ad on TV yet I can get a banner ad on yahoo.com for as little as a few thousand dollars. Yeah you got the occasional user blocking ads but generally people see banners and they work and you can even measure their clickthrough rates, much harder to measure commercial ads except by raw sales to assume the campaign worked.
And if banner ads don't work why is it everyone can make fun of and remember those "punch George W." out for example, obviously it made an impression on you even if it is stupid. - crazymonkey, on 09/24/2009, -2/+5...not to mention sidewalk space with all the stupid vending machines (which are always kicked over by Sunday morning - thanks College town!).
I can't tell you how many people I see tossing them in the garbage as there are no recycling bins in the T stations here in Boston. - xsecretfiles, on 09/24/2009, -0/+3What am I supposed to use for my bird's cage then?
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