Are newspapers just a thing of the past?

On the way into work the other day there was a story featured on NPR about The Tribune Company filing for bankruptcy – this includes most notably the Chicago Tribune and LA Times (it does not include the Chicago Cubs).  The story primarily focused on how the Wall Street journal is changing since Rupert Murdoch bought the paper in the summer of 2007.  The WSJ, now a part of massive News Corporation, has been positioned to be a content distribution channel to other media outlets owned by News Corp.

The quote from the NPR story that really struck me is from Robert Thomson, Managing Editor at The WSJ…

“You think in terms of the cost of content as a once-only expense, and the potential
revenue of content is how much you’re able to repurpose that.”

News Corp media outlets include movie studios, magazines, television, newspapers, book publishing – and not just 1 in each category, but a whole bunch in each of those categories.   What Thomson was getting at is this – if you can have content generated at The WSJ and use that content in several areas (other papers, tv newscasts, etc) than the cost to create content for other areas in News Corp is now reduced.  So the obvious conclusion is that The WSJ can run in the red because it is simply an expense to News Corp’s other businesses.  Well… that’s not the official statement, here’s what Thomson said to that…

“… The Wall Street Journal has to make money to prove that they’re relevant, because if you’re not relevant, you’re irrelevant.  And irrelevance is unsustainable.”

Sure, that may be the company line, but I don’t really buy it.  I think The WSJ will be relevant because of it’s record of journalism and because it’s THE paper of record in the business world and on Wall Street.

This whole story got me to thinking – why do I still get The Plain Dealer everyday of the week except Tuesday and Thursday (don’t ask)?  Well I know I get the Sunday paper because my girlfriend is a coupon clipping freak – but I could always go buy that at my corner drug store on Sundays.  Or, I could find an onine coupon source (all of them seem to be a pain and relevant to me).  I get 90% of my news from RSS feeds (and the Internet in general) – the RSS feeds are so focused on what I want to know and read about.  They are updated several times per day and feed my constant desire for more and more information.

I read magazines too… but mostly because I find free offers on FatWallet and pay nothing for them.  So why not get Road and Track, Golf Magazine and US News & World Report for free?  Would I pay the $20 per year to have this delivered… not a chance.

Back to the newspapers.  What am I missing by completely skipping the newspaper option and staying online?  Well for one, I am missing local coverage that I may actually care about.  Case in point – this fall, the Olmsted Falls girl’s volleyball team (my alma mater) won the Ohio Division I State Championship.  Having been to almost every volleyball game in highschool and being a big fan of the sport, I was very interested.  But, I don’t seek out that information.  If I would have cracked open the PD more, I probably would have ran across this story and others.  Sure, I could search Cleveland.com (the Plain Dealer’s website) and found articles… point being, there are some things “lost” when you are getting your news online from CNN, Drudge, Newsvine, etc.

I suspect I will find Wall Street Journal references popping up more in the coming months and years.  I also suspect that I will NOT see the Chicago Tribune and LA Times referenced nearly as much – if they are around at all.  News Corp owns the Dow Jones Newswire service which is focused on delivering global financial news .  I wonder if News Corp will use the Wall Street Journal to build a more diverse newswire service.  CNN is already doing this and competeing with the AP.

- Bill Weber

photo credit: RcktManIL