Monday, February 09, 2009
How To Save Your Newspaper
This article recently published by Time, about the current problems that newspapers are facing, might be relevant to some of us who are taking CO classes with a print and broadcast journalism slant.
News is hurting in this economy as much as any other industry, perhaps even more so. The business is undergoing a transition that many smaller players might not survive, with the ubiquity of the Internet and the culture conditioned to expect so much information to be free. This is the immediate or near future for many of us.
What do you think should be done? If News were to go back to a fee-based business model, would you be willing to pay for information-- even if you could get it free somewhere else-- for the health of the industry?
"During the past few months, the crisis in journalism has reached meltdown proportions. It is now possible to contemplate a time when some major cities will no longer have a newspaper and when magazines and network-news operations will employ no more than a handful of reporters.
There is, however, a striking and somewhat odd fact about this crisis. Newspapers have more readers than ever. Their content, as well as that of newsmagazines and other producers of traditional journalism, is more popular than ever — even (in fact, especially) among young people.
The problem is that fewer of these consumers are paying. Instead, news organizations are merrily giving away their news. According to a Pew Research Center study, a tipping point occurred last year: more people in the U.S. got their news online for free than paid for it by buying newspapers and magazines. Who can blame them? Even an old print junkie like me has quit subscribing to the New York Times, because if it doesn't see fit to charge for its content, I'd feel like a fool paying for it."
News is hurting in this economy as much as any other industry, perhaps even more so. The business is undergoing a transition that many smaller players might not survive, with the ubiquity of the Internet and the culture conditioned to expect so much information to be free. This is the immediate or near future for many of us.
What do you think should be done? If News were to go back to a fee-based business model, would you be willing to pay for information-- even if you could get it free somewhere else-- for the health of the industry?
# posted by dan @ 4:32 PM 
Comments:
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I have been keeping up with how the news industry has been changing for a "local" example just look at the Clarion Ledger. It is down to half the size it used to be.
I completely agree with the points that were made in the news article about more people getting their news online for free rather than paying for a newspaper. It seems like the smart thing to do as far as a consumer because why pay for something when it isn't necessary.
I think that if the news industry is going to survive (which it will in some fashion) it must realize and accept the changes that are occurring. They have already made the swap to widespread Internet based giving of information. I think the next step will be to charge people in order to view the news site.
In order for this to work all news organizations (at least the large ones) will have to form a united front on the charging because if one decides to charge to make ends meet and another one doesn't it won't work. Honestly, is anyone going to pay to read the news if they could read it for free?
This is an interesting topic!
I completely agree with the points that were made in the news article about more people getting their news online for free rather than paying for a newspaper. It seems like the smart thing to do as far as a consumer because why pay for something when it isn't necessary.
I think that if the news industry is going to survive (which it will in some fashion) it must realize and accept the changes that are occurring. They have already made the swap to widespread Internet based giving of information. I think the next step will be to charge people in order to view the news site.
In order for this to work all news organizations (at least the large ones) will have to form a united front on the charging because if one decides to charge to make ends meet and another one doesn't it won't work. Honestly, is anyone going to pay to read the news if they could read it for free?
This is an interesting topic!
I don't really have the solution, but one thing I think newspapers could look at is stop giving away all their content for "free" (I'm ignoring web advertising that appears on most of these pages for the moment).
The content that comes from the AP/Reuters/McClatchy/etc. that someone can get from any number of sites would certainly have to remain "free." However, any content exclusive to the paper should require some kind of subscription model. And a lot of patience. It would probably take some time to acclimate viewers to paying for news again, but it's something that can be, and will have to be done.
And there are business models that exist that give some ideas on how to do this. For example, a paper like the New York Times could offer its premium content in way that iTunes offers music tracks. People are accustomed to clicking a "Buy Now" button to purchase things for pocket change.
The content that comes from the AP/Reuters/McClatchy/etc. that someone can get from any number of sites would certainly have to remain "free." However, any content exclusive to the paper should require some kind of subscription model. And a lot of patience. It would probably take some time to acclimate viewers to paying for news again, but it's something that can be, and will have to be done.
And there are business models that exist that give some ideas on how to do this. For example, a paper like the New York Times could offer its premium content in way that iTunes offers music tracks. People are accustomed to clicking a "Buy Now" button to purchase things for pocket change.
I thought the article was really interesting. People keep talking about the decline of newspapers, but I found it intriguing that readership is actually significantly up; however, it's not in print, it's only online. I think it's perfectly reasonable to ask people to pay for a service, particularly a service that can be quite expensive to produce. I think it is perplexing that viewership on these sites is up but advertising is down. I wonder if this is because of the economy. I think it's interesting that the WSJ already charges for their services and they have seen an increase in subscriptions over the last year. I do agree with the author, however, that it makes more since to charge per article or paper rather than monthly, since most people would rather just read an article at a time. Maybe papers could also offer package rates as well? I think there could be multiple business models that could be successful.
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