Several weeks ago, I wrote a blog about the fate of political cartoons in an increasingly online world. The fate of newspapers themselves also remains uncertain. The current economic climate has made the newspapers' already shaky grip on solvency even more tenuous. Some people think it wouldn't be a bad thing if they went the way of 8mm movie cameras and mimeographs, but I think otherwise.

First: What are some of the reasons one might argue that newspapers should go away?

Ecological: They are printed on paper. Harvesting trees and making newsprint is really bad for the environment.

Access: Initially, the printing press was a way for anyone to make their voice heard. It was the pamphleteers that had a huge impact on the people of colonial America and their decision to split from England. Nowadays, newspapers are huge corporate entities, and "regular" people don't have a chance. The internet is the preferred venue now for average people to get their voices heard.

Economic: Pretty much any news you need is available for free on the internet. Why should anyone pay for a subscription to a newspaper?

Relevancy: By the time it's printed and delivered to your door, it's yesterday's news.


These all seem fairly compelling. So what do newspapers offer?

Accuracy: Before a story is printed in the paper, it gets fact-checked, proof-read, and edited. Sources are cross-referenced. If it's printed in the paper, you can pretty much guarantee that it's the truth. Compare that with online stories that are breathlessly posted and linked to satiate someone's ego to be "first". How many times have rumors or hearsay been printed as real news items? How about stuff that someone got from a "source" that turned out to be someone just making it all up?

Reporting: while it's true that most national and world news is reported by one of the big news agencies (AP, API, Reuters, etc.), they tend to go for the low-hanging fruit. What about investigative journalism? What about local news? A "blogger" sitting at home is rarely the one that goes down to the courthouse and digs through the records to unearth a story. We need reporters, and they need to be paid.

Tactile: This is more opinion on my part, but there's something about laying on the couch on Sunday, drinking coffee and digging through the paper. Even with a laptop (or some newfangled media "tablet"), that is not the same. With a newspaper you can open up a section and see everything quickly, decide what to read, and focus on the things that interest you.

Community: Every big city has "quality of life" factors, revolving around restaurants, live music, the arts, the theatre, and special events. The newspapers provide a special community service by providing local cultural news and reviews, sometimes introducing people to things they may not have known was available, or piquing their interest. Without a newspaper, who is going to pay the restaurant reviewer that eats at places you didn't even know existed? Without the the theatre critic, how are you going to know if that new play in town sucks or is a smash?


If newspapers DO eventually go 100% online, then my hope is that they offer 2 models. Either free with advertising, or with a subscription and little to no advertising. I would be willing to be pay for a subscription to get the content I can't currently get online. I also get really annoyed with the intrusive ads.

One of the main reasons that I decided to write this today is because of recent changes to the AJC. With subscriptions declining, they decided they needed to revamp. Rather than go with expertise, they went with focus groups. Rather than let the seasoned newspaper editors decide on changes, they let the executives make the decisions.

As a result, the AJC now looks like a cheap knock-off of USA Today. Where it used to have separate Style, Arts, and Travel sections, they've all been combined into one, making sharing the newspaper with a partner more difficult, and finding the stories and columns you want more aggravating. They've also decided to make the OpEd page "more fair and balanced" so as to attract the more conservative residents of the state outside of the city of Atlanta, and demoted most of the editorial staff in the process.

That last part is particularly troubling for a couple reasons: First, the page was already balanced. They generally had "pro/con" columns for whatever topic they were discussing (balanced). They also printed liberal/conservative letters in whatever percentage in which they were received (fair). Secondly, it is the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, not the GA Journal-Constitution. Instead of marketing the paper to the entire state, they should try harder to market it to their true demographic. (Here's a link to a story on the saga. For some amusement, here's a link to an online ad the AJC created to sell their recent stylistic changes. The comments are great)

Ultimately, for newspapers to survive, they need to make people realize that in-depth investigative reporting and coverage of local news and events is worth the price of the paper. No amount of font changes and focus groups is ever going to help if they don't understand that basic concept. Consider me a luddite, but I love my paper, and hope I never have to give it up.