The uber-bleak newspaper industry.......

[marmar]

from Editor & Publisher:



Shocker: ASNE Cancels 2009 Editors' Convention
By Greg Mitchell

Published: February 27, 2009 12:55 PM ET


NEW YORK - In yet another sad sign of the times, The American Society of Newspaper Editors (ASNE) today announced it has canceled its 2009 convention. The last time it called off its popular annual assembly was during World War II.

Plans to hold the convention in Chicago, April 26-29, were well under way, but president Charlotte Hall said in a statement that ASNE’s leadership had “concluded that the challenges editors face at their newspapers demand their full attention.”

Hall said that it had become clear that attendance would have been sharply lower than normal because of the budgetary problems within the industry.

“Even though the learning opportunities at the convention would have been valuable, the greatest priority is leading our own newsrooms as we shape the future of the business,” Hall said.

Hall said ASNE’s 2010 Convention remains scheduled for April 11-14 in Washington. .......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003946221

[roseBudd]

1. If we lose newspapers liberals are screwed

[ProgressiveProfessor]

2. Why...the newer methods of communication are clearly more open and easier access

For too long the print barons controlled things. They can not control the Web and other network based comms

[Earth_First]

6. Rural communities? Urban households? Elder populations?

It affects more than you'd think...

[ProgressiveProfessor]

8. The newspapers don'tserve them well at all, and the ability of online resouces to tailor to their

needs is much more than newspapers could ever be.

[misanthrope]

10. Where the niched exists it will be filled, as it is now...

...There are small town newspapers out there with circulation under 15,000 as is. As long as their immediate population values local news that can't be found on the Web, they should have a market.

[roseBudd]

13. Newspapers are supported by ad revenue, their business model has been disrupted by

EBay & Craig's List.

The tanking economy has been a second blow.

New York Times Co. , battling along with the rest of the newspaper industry to remain solvent during the financial meltdown, said Wednesday its fourth quarter profit fell 48%, reflecting the reduced value of an asset at the International Herald Tribune, severance costs and ongoing declines in advertising sales.

Today on DU you are privileged to read:

New York Times Legislation to Overhaul Rockefeller Drug Laws Moves Ahead Swiftly
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/01/nyregion/01rockefeller.html?ref=nyregion

The Ecstasy and the Agony - Frank Rich
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/01/opinion/01rich.html?_r=2

Even Worse for Young Workers - Bob Herbert
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/28/opinion/28herbert.html

And then there is WaPo

Washington Post Co., publisher of the namesake newspaper and Newsweek magazine, said fourth- quarter profit fell 77 percent as advertising sales declined and it wrote down the value of some assets.

I repeat, if we lose newspapers liberals and democracy are screwed.

[spanone]

22. i'm with ya

[roseBudd]

12. Virtually everything you read online began with a reporter in a newsroom & went through an editor

All that online news we read for free was not produced for free in a newsroom.

I don't think anyone on DU would argue that TV or radio news compares with news created by newspaper newsrooms.

It was a SW Ohio newspaper that sent a reporter to the BoE of 7 counties on Nov.4, 2004 that revealed that the Warren County BoE barred the press from watching the tabulation and that the excuse was a Homeland Security terrorism warning that never happened.

And that is an example of easy. How about foreign bureaus?

If you think unpaid bloggers will make up the slack or suddenly be able to sell enough advertising on their blogs so they can quit their day jobs and hire lawyers to enforce sunshine laws then you don't understand the difficulty of replacing the fourth estate with laypersons.

[misanthrope]

17. What do you see in the future?...

...What needs to happen for a free press to survive?

[roseBudd]

20. Most think they are going to have to figure out a way to get some type of payment from readers

for all the content they are currently making available for free. People realize it needs to be not a subscription model but a small charge per article.

Some look to the Kindle but IMHO having to buy hardware unless the price comes way down is not at all feasible.

I know I am glad this is not happening under a Republican administration. Newspapers have factiness responsibilities and that is why the GOP wages a perpetual war against the NYTimes & the Washington Post.

I don't have a problem with DU excerpting newspaper work product and I hope a majority of DUers click through to read more and reward the originating paper with their page views.

But I personally don't visit Common Dreams for the opposite reason.

[roseBudd]

16. It is reporters working out of newsrooms that create the news you read on the internet

You're just not paying for it.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

23. Newsrooms are not lmited print newspapers

The economics are a struggle but the business model is resolving over time

[BlooInBloo]

19. BWAHAHAAHAAAAA!!!!

[OffWithTheirHeads]

3. People used to buy newspapers because there was news in them

Real investigative reporting, overseas bureaus, real information you could use. People are not buying newspapers because they have been forced to alternate venues to find out what is really happening.

If newspapers still published news, George the Bush wouldn't have survived his first term in office without being impeached and people would still be buying newspapers.

I predict the same decline in the T.V. machine audience for the same reason. It's not news, it's corporate propaganda and people are slowly starting to figure it out.

Personally, I stopped watching MSM "News" shows about the time of the first OJ trial. It's all bullshit, all the time. I still subscribe to a newspaper, have almost all my life, in fact, my very first job was a paper boy. I subscribe because I like the morning ritual as a way to begin the day but I long ago stopped expecting to find anything more substantial than sound bites and thinly veiled opinion pretending to be news.

Too bad, really, I expect the newspaper to die within years and I'll miss it.

[misanthrope]

9. People still read the news, they just don't subscribe to it...

...They get it on their computers and hand-held devices. It's faster, more varied and more convenient.

[leftofthedial]

4. There are only a hundred or so of them left,

why do they need a convention?

[marmar]

5. There are a lot more than 100 or so newspapers left......

n/t

[leftofthedial]

7. Okay.

112 then.

[marmar]

11. Umm.....okay

:eyes:

[leftofthedial]

14. the point is to agree with the OP--the industry is hurting and in free fall

lighten up a little.

[ProudToBeBlueInRhody]

15. Of course, the reich-wing will celebrate it's demise

Keep the public uneducated and in the dark. Bombard them with talk radio.

[roseBudd]

18. Exactly, talk radio has a much lower infrastructure cost. And cable news is laughable

[spanone]

21. certain people would like faux nooze as the only source in the world

newspapers are going the way of radio stations.....