We're losing newspapers and good journalists because we don't read newspapers any more. So...

what is an ethical consumer choice?

I quit getting the paper years ago, but read it online, along w a few others. Why buy it? It's messy! It's crappy! It makes tons of rubbish and wastes trees! There's no news in it!

So now, I'm out of the papers' circulation numbers for ad revenue. For good reason- I don't see the ads.

At the same time, around the country, we are losing good journalists. What the hell am I going to read online if there are no papers?

See moaning about losing our science writer here... http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x5173590

So what is an ethical choice? Subscribe to our crappy paper and waste resources? I guess that might be the only thing to do. And I think it's a shame that the newspapers haven't figured out how to make money off of people like me, or if they have, I don't know about it. I would actually pay money for a good online newspaper subscription.

If this has all been handled on the continent and I just don't know about it, then clue me in. I will sure welcome the information. We need those journalists now more than ever, we really do.

Mahalo...

There is no stopping it and they are just going to have to adapt or fall by the wayside.

I usually say no, but didn't this time. It will cost me $20 for like 5 months.

i'm not saying you did anything wrong. we all did. the internet is free, right?

so the result of free is that the available content will just be any asshole's opinion on the internet.

some think that is a great thing. some think that totally sucks. the fact remains that your information will be reduced to craigslist postings.

believe them? don't believe them?

who knows?

in the US. It goes back to the strategy we've seen played out for 30 - 50 years by the owner class, they bought the media to limit what voices are heard. They installed subservient managers/editors to spike or downplay news that the owners didn't want out there, the journalists, being the generally intelligent people they are, saw what happened and understood that if they got out of line their paychecks would cease, so they stopped looking as hard or as deep as they, presumably, wanted to.

We see the very same thing happening in a myriad of other professions and among employees in general, people are afraid of losing their jobs and they know they have no recourse and the market sucks, so they keep their heads down and do what they are told and become warm slavish bodies filling a spot.

the "free" of the internet.

that free is something that no one (outside of porn) has ever been able to take advantage of.

papers tried to do the internet. some tried to charge. it didn't work. so most went with the free. and lost subscriptions, day by day, to those who could just read the content for free.

and with no one to pay for the content, the content producers had to move to other professions as they rather quickly lost their jobs.

it really is that simple.

subscriptions from the newspapers did so because there was no reporting going on. Just like now, I get my news from foreign sources and from what is distilled on DU, and even then, most of the US stuff posted is meaningless distraction and propaganda with very little content.

Right now, every day huge things are happening, life shaping decision are made and all the "news" agencies do is reprint a small percentage of what comes over the wire. Hell, even the WSJ cut the news content of their paper in half, opting for filler from Reuters and API.

A good example is what AOL/T/W did when they bought CNN. CNN had a huge number of contributing reporters all over the world (that's how Ted built it in the first place) submitting stories daily. The first thing AOL did was fire 80% of the reporting staff. Murdoch's conglomerate works the same way, one story is written in England and it is reported in every outlet over and over, and of course, any story that come up that doesn't fit into the picture he paints is never seen.

We also seem to be overlooking the success of the free papers, LA Weekly, New Times, The Chicago Reader, etc. have been breaking major stories for well over a decade now, making a profit in the process, and they give their papers away for free.

No, there's still a market for portable, persistent news, it is the corporate model that had failed. Blaming the internet is just like the recording industry blaming peer-to-peer for it's decline, the problem is the content they put forth.

Still better than Fox . . .

If they can't, who can?

adverse effect in the long run.

I'll use an example. Remember the Kerry/bush** debates when it was absolutely clear that blivet had on some kind of apparatus and was getting his cues from somewhere off stage? Did any of these soon to be defunct point that out? Because that was a scandal of the first magnitude, a guy so stupid he had to be wired in a presidential debate.

Remember the run up to Shock and Awe? How much ass kissing of the bush** admin did they do? The famous NYT apology for not doing their job and covering for the criminals in the White House? Because they didn't want to 'influence the election? Well their job WAS to influence that election by bringing the truth out in the open, by reporting what they knew.

Remember the last 8 years? Where the hell were they?

But the bad thing is that a LOT of people who do not troll the internet for news (for whatever reason, but I'll use the elderly for example). The have no source (good, bad, or indifferent) for news if the newspapers fold. And as someone here pointed out to me the other day, local issues are best covered by local 'newspapers'.

They did it to themselves but this outcome is NOT a good thing.

Newspapers are still fumbling about trying to reinvent themselves in an online fashion. Without having to pay printing costs, the ones that DO have content worth paying for will be able to make a go of it. But content worth paying for is not going to be a rehash of wire service headlines, each of which already has a website. People will pay to read interesting local gossip with their morning coffee that they can't get anywhere else. So yes, they do have to get good journalists back out into the field, finding out who paid off whom to get the contract to repave the same section of highway for the third time in as many years.

Many of the alternative weeklies have figured this out, since their papers are free in the first place. Which is not a bad development, since alternative weeklies are generally far to the left of the curmudgeonly main stream fishwrap.

When I am in a new city and want to learn about the local area, I bypass the racks with coin slots and pick up the alternative weekly. FAR better coverage of local issues, plus better dining and entertainment guides. Plus the MSM doesn't carry 'News of the Weird' or 'Savage Love'.

thing at the same time. I'm like that.

I guess we're all lucky that these corporations are just so adamant in their stupidity.
:kick:

Corporations want to cut costs, so they standardize on one thing and no matter how much "have it your way" advertising they pump out, it's still the same old shit for mass consumption. Hamburgers, newspapers, reality shows, blue jeans, everything is a mass produced bland product with some different garnishes to give it the appearance if individuality. I keep thinking life must have been much more interesting before the invention of the corporation and mass marketing.

and I think that's a great idea. They should be non-profit. Think of it as PBS for the news.

I don't know, maybe we could start a foundation here in Colorado to buy the Rocky Mountain News' equipment and rights to its archives/website/newsroom and start publishing it non-profit.

Sort of an odd thing