Entries from Lucas Grindley's blog | Exploring the new way for journalism tagged with 'Dying Newspapers'
Not even bargain hunters want a newspaper, NYT says
In the category of "signs newspapers are about to die," the New York Times reports: "While all publicly traded newspaper companies have seen their share prices fall in the last year — drops of 50 to 70 percent are commonplace...
Newspapers hear the fat lady warming up her voice
Maybe if there wasn't an impending recession, then newspapers could have skated past the thin ice protecting them from drowning in red ink. If advertisers still spent like during the boom days, then the latest report from Borrell about which...
L.A. Times editor given too much power
While interviewing for a few jobs recently, I asked a prospective boss whether the Web department had its own budget or was part of the larger newsroom budget. He asked me to repeat the question just to see if he’d...
Whining about your impending death is not medicinal
Even after all these years of declining circulation numbers, declining revenues, and increased layoffs and page count cuts, most people in newspapers still don't understand what's happening to printed newspapers. Instead, they wait for a magical Web business model to...
Zell: Top-down management creates Web sites that 'suck'
My new hero in the world is becoming billionaire Sam Zell, who is using a speaking tour of the Tribune Co. to explain the virtues of letting employees take the wheel instead of corporate know-it-all's. This line earned cheers from...
Editor quits after forces of status quo attack
All we know for sure is the Mercury News' editor suddenly resigned. The rumors say she proposed too many changes, some of which fulfilled my prediction that standalone Sports sections could soon hit the cutting room floor. Here's how E&P...;
Copy Editor vs. The Computer
Amidst a long memo announcing staff cuts and reorganization, The Morning Call lets it slip that copy editors are slowly being replaced by a glorified computer spell check. As someone who supports new technology, I can't argue against the logic...
Orlando Sentinel cuts NASCAR, focuses on local sports
In a memo to the Orlando Sentinel staff, NASCAR coverage was officially cut today. "With the increasing demand to produce local news, we've decided to eliminate our national NASCAR coverage and focus more on local sports coverage," it states. This...
As the sports writers leave, so too might the sections
This is the time of year for predictions, so here goes. During 2008, at least one newspaper will collapse its daily standalone sports section into the rest of the paper, conceding that it can only compete on local coverage and...
PRESSTIME, here are the right answers
The latest edition of PRESSTIME includes a Q&A; with Web entrepreneurs who get nearly all the answers wrong. Thankfully, I'm here to set these millionaires straight. There's so many things to correct that this entry is the first in a...
Newsroom not needed for community sites
What I’ve seen while helping to launch our first user-submitted Web site, PortCharlotteVoice.com, is piqued excitement and involvement from the Advertising and Marketing sides of the business. Their level of participation is enough that it begs the question about whether...
Newspapers condescend what they fear most: Red Eye
Every newspaper secretly knows its kryptonite. But newspapers’ real flaw is a hubris so pervasive that it stops them from admitting weakness and actually doing something. The latest example of this principle is fleshed out in a journo-debate spotted by...
Newspapers lose monopoly on journalism grads
I’m supposed to talk with a journalism class on Monday at the University of South Florida, my alma mater. Knowing what I know about how frustrated young graduates become when they hit the wall that is newspaper culture, what should...
Study suggests newspaper editors are clueless
It’s time to consider an uncomfortable reality: What if newspaper editors are doing a sucky job of picking the day’s top stories? A study by the Project for Excellence in Journalism shows news lineups are far different from the norm...
How to save the Albuquerque Tribune
Investors shouldn’t let a good opportunity pass by again. If I were to buy the Albuquerque Tribune, which Romenesko points out was put up for sale by Scripps, here’s a list of things I would do to reinvent the newspaper....
Final closing bell nears for standalone business sections
Business and features sections are to newspapers what art and gym classes are to public schools -- the first to go when the budget gets tight. The latest in a long list of examples is the Winston-Salem Journal, which cut...
Post declares WWN 'dead'
Wired reported last week that the supermarket tabloid, Weekly World News, is ending its print version and going online-only. But the Washington Post just called the publication "dead" and made no mention of its life on the Web. Someone's wrong....
AP predicts never again – again
After Sam Zell bought the Tribune Co., the AP wrote a story about how very unlikely it was that anymore newspaper companies would change hands. Now with the sale of Dow Jones to tycoon Rupert Murdoch, the AP is back...
Raising cover price hurts newspapers in long run
A warning for newspapers grasping at expense cuts: Be careful not to exacerbate the problem you’re trying to solve, which is declining advertising revenue. Shortfalls in advertising revenue are not solely an income problem. The revenue drop is first and...
As papers close down, opportunities pass by
Time to check in on a prediction Wired magazine made (and I seconded) at the start of the year. Wired said a newspaper will combat revenue declines by ending print publication and going online-only. An opportunity for that change is...
Prepare for salary cuts across the board
In what is sure to become a trend across the industry, The Daily Herald out of Chicago cut all employee salaries by 5 percent to combat falling revenues. Plan now. Many of you will make less money in the near...
Still hoping for a fourth-quarter comeback?
Any hopes that print advertising revenues would recover during the last three months of 2007 should start withering with the announcement of first-quarter earnings in a few days. Optimistic executives might be tempted to retract earlier predictions of a late...
Go ahead, I dare you to listen to David Lazarus
SFGate.com columnist David Lazarus says newspapers should start charging for access to their Web sites. And if someone listens to him, then I'm going to get very rich. Let me just promise right now. If any local newspaper decides to...
The worst-case scenario game
What happens if the sliding print revenues of 2006 become permanent or worsen? The reality is that most newspaper companies are not prepared to make the switch from primarily print-focused to Web-focused. So if print revenue can no longer support...
Wired's top 40 trends
Wired is letting users decide what trends will affect tech businesses in the coming year as it writes its Wired 40 list of top companies. And it's a lot of fun. Rate each trend or submit your own and watch...
RIP, MERCURY NEWS
What started out as a way for the San Jose Mercury News to attract new readers has now been cut to save money. The “Read This!” section for teens and written by teens had appeared on the back page of...
One way to survive the stock price slide
Wall Street expects newspapers to maintain huge profit margins. But during this transition to a new reality, those margins must slide. So investing in the online future means pissing off shareholders now. Investing in the online future costs money. It...
Eyes wide open, but feet firmly planted
Said Philip Meyer, Knight Chair in Journalism at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill: "Things are so bad in the newspaper business today that I am inclined to root for all sorts of radical experiments that I would...
Is it OK to sabotage Craigslist?
Newspapers are losing millions of dollars to Craigslist. Lost revenue leads to layoffs and budget cuts. So, I have to ask, is it OK to sabotage Craigslist? Seriously. It’s an option. So we should at least discuss it. What’s stopping...
Craigslist combats spam with traditional business model
In earlier posts, I inferred that Craigslist’s only methods for eliminating racism and prostitution from its Web site are a flagging system and “education” pages. But it turns out there’s one other way – charging users. Here’s how the San...
Some newspapers need economics lesson
Spending all this time working online has led me to a theory. All news – no matter the subject or how targeted its audience – should be free. First of all, the goal of any newspaper or magazine is to...
The 7th Step; Beyond CraigsList
Newspapers should take what they know about their kryptonite and use it against each other. Remember Rule No. 1. “If newspapers are going to survive, first some must die.” Maybe even more than most industries, newspapers spend time identifying and...
Syllabus for 'The New Way'
The New Way for newspapers comes with a few “new rules,” as Bill Maher likes to call them. Only these are serious. 1. If newspapers are going to survive, first some newspapers will have to die. And it’s every man...
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