Random 60: What can save newspapers? | Favorite on Viddler.
Can anything save newspapers? Today I’m joined by Rob and Bernie, two of my coworkers, and we all have simple ideas that may help save the newspapers for us. For Rob he thought he needed to see more talk about technology in his local newspaper. Bernie said the main reason he gets the newspaper, like so many others, is to help his family save money using coupons. For me, I’d much rather an online solution by giving my local news on my phone or with alerts.
What would save newspapers for you? Would you subscribe to them in paper form or online?
13 Comments
Definitely if my Uncle Colin Devroe was the editor. :3
Yeah they need to make newspapers technical and send stories to my email or something that I check daily…otherwise…I’ll never read it.
Awww thanks Kalie!
I’m not sure if physical newspapers will survive, at least not as a daily thing. News moves so quickly these days that people know what happened way before they read the newspaper in the morning, either from a 24 hour news network, or from the Internet. I think if newspapers moved to a monthly magazine type format, where they really delved into certain issues, they might have a chance of surviving, at least in print form.
Other than that, though, they’re going to have to start to understand this whole “internet” thing and start using it to its full potential.
Some people do not watch the news or read news online – for those people I think they’d love the best of the news put in a newspaper format on a weekly/monthly basis.
If they “got the Internet” thing – how would you have them make money?
Well, if a paper were to completely get rid of their physical newspaper, they would significantly lower their costs: no printing, delivery, etc., and I would assume that their online costs are far less than their printing costs.
I don’t believe newspapers will go away completely, not in our lifetimes anyway. The way we consume media has always evolved but Radio didn’t make newspapers go away, television didn’t make radio go away and the internet didn’t make TV go away. However, it did force them to evolve to die.
I don’t believe there is anything that can save the newspapers as they are today. However, they can evolve by supplying consumers what they can’t readily get from the web.
What is that you ask? It’s good, local, neighborhood news.
We still want to know about our neighborhoods so we may see the loss of large mainstream news, but we will see smaller local rags move to the forefront…if only for a brief second. Till someone comes along and changes the paradigm on our local news.
Long story short, the best way to save the newspapers isn’t to save them, but to re-evaluate their consumer base and evolve into something that provides them with what they want.
Excellent points Chris. Although vague – saying they just need to evolve. I’d like to know what you think they’d need to do to get YOU as a customer?
The print aspect of newspapers will go away, there is not a doubt in my mind. I work at the paper and it is extremely costly to print the paper every day.
News will always survive, just how you receive it will change.
The current business model is broken. We don’t make money from subscriptions, we make money from selling the number of subscribers we have to advertisers whom in return buy advertising which pays for the paper. This is the same business model online as with many other sites. More page views, streams, etc, the more advertisers you can get.
Papers have to keep it local (unless you are NY Times, LA Times, USA Today, etc). But not only keep it local, they need to adapt and be able to adapt quickly. Something we have failed at time and time again.
Think about it, the paper has been your way of getting news for 75+ years. It’s a really old business model run by people that don’t want to break that mold, they believe in it.
To me the only way to start change is do away with old thinking and this is something most newspapers have not been able to do yet. They need younger, fresher more forward thinking minds; not employees doing this for 30+ years and now being forced to go online, that is sub-par at best.
Sorry I could rant for days, it just kills me that people do have ideas and they are killed before they see the light of day.
Adaptation is key and until we can do this we will fail and continue to fail.
Click to play this video.
http://www.plasticlogic.com/
I agree with Bernie. I ONLY buy the paper for the coupons. I am disappointed in you Colin. When he said that, you should have said that was the only reason I buy it! You know better!!!
We ran over as it was!!
The current newspaper print model is obsolete in a world where I can get news/weather/movie time, etc. in real time on my iPhone.
I see the real opportunity for the newspapers as something like Kyle stated. Take the time to go in depth on important issues and stories and release these articles in a bi-weekly or monthly print journal format. Leverage the name recognition with an online presence that focuses on real time news and events.
As long as the papers keep trying to print current news, they will fail. “Tomorrow’s headline” doesn’t have the same meaning anymore. Now, “tomorrow’s headline” was just yesterday’s news.
Of course the smart ass in me just wants to say the newspapers can’t go away, what else will people line their bird cages with?