Newspaper+Collapse

March 24, 2009

-**What is happening** A large number of major (and minor) newspapers are loosing considerable amounts of revenue [A] and therefore forced to cut back on their staff [B] even though readership is higher then ever before (mostly online) but the number of paying newspaper subscribers is plummeting, and newspapers need to revise their business plans. Interestingly, newspaper circulation is going up across the world except for the US where it is going down rapidly.


 * A - loss of revenue**
 * Loss of advertising dollars per ad (internet,tv competition)
 * People trust newspapers less and are going online and other sources for news
 * The 2003 "do not call" law hurt newspapers a lot, as up to 60% of their new customers were from cold calling [2]


 * The increasing size of conglomerate superstores is decreasing the need for local advertisement, which is traditionally done with newspapers.
 * Google news and other internet news aggregation sites, which allows obtaining content without visiting the original site (and seeing their ads)
 * Loss of Classified Ad's that used to be major income sources for newspapers to craigslist, ebay, job search sites, etc


 * B - Common cutbacks**
 * rely more on news wire - Associated Press for story sources instead of using local reporters
 * Local Newspapers making agreements to share reporters
 * Public less material (Less printing cost and less material needed)
 * go online exclusively to save printing costs
 * close down the paper

At least 120 newspapers in the U.S. have shut down since January 2008. Estimated lost of 2,166+ newspaper jobs have been cut between june-december 2007, 15,704+ jobs in 2008 and 6,202+ job losses in 2009 (so far).
 * Who**

Major papers that are going all digital and are near bankruptcy The Minneapolis Star Tribune, The Philadelphia Daily News, The Miami Herald, The Detroit News, The Boston Globe ,The San Francisco Chronicle , The Chicago Sun Times ,NY Daily News ,The Fort Worth Star Telegram ,The Cleveland Plain Dealer, Christian Science Monitor, Seattle Post-Intelligencer -Consolation of newspapers to a less confusing selection of choices -Newspapers will be stronger economically and be more stable in the future -Reduces the cost of production (newspapers are cheaper for the consumer) -More content is going to be available online, cell phones, kindle, etc which is more accessible -Helps the environment (less paper waste, oil & trucks for delivery)
 * PRO**

-The power of the news is controlled by a ever increasingly smaller group of individuals -Less original work is published, less likely to see press breakthroughs -Most small town newspapers are going to fold, leaving fewer truly "local" news sources -Traditionally, newspapers are the primary media that holds government accountable for their actions -Newspaper readership tends to follow literacy rates, which some sources claim has been decreasing. -People expect everything to be free online, but online ads are not enough to pay for their costs anymore Subscriptions, micropayments are needed. -Newspapers that have both online & print - about 10% of their readers are print but make up for 90% of their revenue (and vise versa)
 * CON**

@http://www.bivingsreport.com/campaign/newspapers06_tz-fgb.pdf [1] Newspaper Circulation Continues Decline, Forcing Tough Decisions, Wall Street journal, May 5th 2005 [2] @http://publishing2.com/2007/07/17/newspaper-online-vs-print-ad-revenue-the-10-problem/ [3]

@http://247wallst.com/2009/03/24/ten-major-newspapers-that-will-fold-or-go-digital-an-update/ @http://www.huffingtonpost.com/charles-karel-bouley/the-end-of-newsprint-not_b_178133.html

Paper cuts - dedicated website for tracking newspaper shutdowns @http://graphicdesignr.net/papercuts/