Years and years after some pundits
began predicting the end of newspapers, the newspapers themselves are
finally realizing that it’s over. Huge debt, high costs, declining
subscription rates, plummeting ad base–will the last one out please
turn off the lights.
On their way out, though, we’re hearing a lot of, “you’ll miss us
when we’re gone…” laments. I got to thinking about this. It’s never
good to watch people lose their livelihoods or have to move on to
something new, even if it might be better. I respect and honor the hard
work that so many people have put into newspapers along the way. If we
make a list of newspaper attributes and features, which ones would you
miss?
Wood pulp? Printing presses? Typesetting machines? Delivery trucks? Those stands on the street and the newsstand? I think we’re OK
without them.
The sports section? No, that’s better online, and in no danger of
going away. In fact, overwritten commentary by the masses is burgeoning.
The weather? Ditto. Comics are even better online, and I don’t think we’ll run out of those.
Book and theater and restaurant reviews? In fact, there are more of
these online, often better, definitely more personal and relevant, and
also in no danger of going away.
The full page ads for local department stores? The free standing inserts on Sunday? The supermarket coupons? Easily replaced.
How about the editorials and op eds? Again, I think we’re not going
to see opinion go away, in fact, the web amplifies the good stuff.
What’s left is local news, investigative journalism and intelligent
coverage of national news. Perhaps 2% of the cost of a typical paper. I
worry about the quality of a democracy when the the state government or
the local government can do what it wants without intelligent coverage.
I worry about the abuse of power when the only thing a corrupt official
needs to worry about is the TV news. I worry about the quality of
legislation when there isn’t a passionate, unbiased reporter there to
explain it to us.
But then I see the in depth stories about the gowns to be worn to
the inauguration or the selection of the White House dog and I wonder
if newspapers are the most efficient way to do this anyway.
The web has excelled at breaking the world into the tiniest independent parts. We don’t use this to support that
online. Things support themselves. The food blog isn’t a loss leader
for the gardening blog. They’re separate, usually run by separate
people or organizations.
Punchline: if we really care about the investigation and the
analysis, we’ll pay for it one way or another. Maybe it’s a public
good, a non profit function. Maybe a philanthropist puts up money for
prizes. Maybe the Woodward and Bernstein of 2017 make so much money
from breaking a story that it leads to a whole new generation of
journalists.
The reality is that this sort of journalism is relatively cheap
(compared to everything else the newspaper had to do in order to bring
it to us.) Newspapers took two cents of journalism and wrapped in
ninety-eight cents of overhead and distraction. The magic of the web,
the reason you should care about this even if you don’t care about the
news, is that when the marginal cost of something is free and when the
time to deliver it is zero, the economics become magical. It’s like 6
divided by zero. Infinity.
I’m not worried about how muckrakers will make a living. Tree farmers, on the other hand, need to find a new use for newsprint.
(Image source: Mediabistro.com)
