THE BLOGGING JOURNALIST

If People Really Want Newspapers, They Will Pay for Them

In a May 25, 2009, editorial headlined “Newspapers’ future,” the Financial Times (FT.com) told its readers  “With each month, newspapers look less like a business and more like a lost cause.”

The specialty publication, which claims to be doing well with online subscriptions, added:

The crisis is acute in the US, where some newspaper groups are in Chapter 11 bankruptcy and there are questions over the long-term future even of venerable titles such as The New York Times and The Washington Post.

FT.com ended the editorial with this: “Perhaps some of the reporting done up to now by for-profit papers will in future be funded by foundations or trusts. But the industry should not lose faith in the free market. When people really want or need something, they will pay for it, one way or another. If today’s publishers cannot convince their readers to do so, they will be overtaken by others that can.”

Technorati Tags: Financial Times,Newspapers,Newspapers' Future

The Observer: ‘Will Philadelphia be the Place Where the American Newspaper Dies?’

“The American city of Philadelphia “is running in a race no one wants to win: which major US city will be the first to lose all its daily papers?” Paul Harris of the TheObserver of London told that publications readers on May 24, 2009. In a long post headlined “Will Philadelphia be the place where the American newspaper dies?”, he noted:

Los Angeles, Boston, Detroit, San Francisco, Miami, Denver and Newark are just a few of the other reluctant participants. The impact of losing all newspapers in these cities is potentially profound; many fear it would be a blow to American democracy. They worry that the watchdog role the press has played will be removed. The bedrock on which much of civic society has been built since colonial times will start to crumble. Yet one of these cities could lose all print news within a year.

Harris said, “You can choose metaphors to illustrate how technologically outdated newspapers have become in a media landscape dominated by blogs and the internet. They are vinyl records in an iPod world; videotapes in the era of DVDs and Hulu; typewriters in the face of the laptop. They are an old technology no one wants, needs or, increasingly, seems to care for. Certainly not in Philadelphia, where both the Inquirer and the Daily News are in bankruptcy.

Technorati Tags: The Philadelphia Daily News,The Philadelphia Inquirer,The Observer of London,Paul Harris

Bloggers, John Yoo and The Philadelphia Inquirer

Recommended: The Philadelphia Citypaper’s May 18, 2009, post “The Inquirer editorial page sounds off on bloggers. Ugh” and Philebrity.com’s May 18, 2009, post headlined post “Day 6 Of Inky Boycott Reveals: People Will Blame Bloggers For Anything, And, Natch, PW Still Sucks.”

The posts are response to Philadelphia Inquirer editorial page editor and opinion columnist Harold Jackson’s May 17, 2009, post headlined “Uproar over Inquirer's Yoo ignores opinion page purpose,” which is about the protest and criticism that erupted when The Inquirer hired former Bush Administration Justice Department lawyer John Yoo to write a column for the paper.  Jackson notes that Yoo is “the former Bush Justice Department official who penned memos legitimizing torture of terror suspects.” Some critics say Yoo shouldn’t be given a platform to espouse his view. See “Why is John Yoo Writing for the Inquirer?”

“Unfortunately,” Jackson writes, “most of the critics of our contract with Yoo have their facts wrong.

“But that happens when your information comes from those bloggers who never let the facts get in the way when they're trying to whip people into a frenzy to boost Web site hits,” he charged.

“It's a shame that one blogger who disseminated poor information is actually a full-time journalist for a sister publication in The Inquirer building.”

Technorati Tags: John Yoo,Harold Jackson,Philadelphia Inquirer,Philadelphia City Paper,Philebrity.Com