Newspapers Will Soon Be Obsolete
Since I was a precocious elementary school student, I have always started my day eating breakfast while reading the morning newspaper. Since those halcyon days many things have changed, but my morning routine has remained the same.
I write a weekly editorial for a newspaper, but I know that print publications will soon be as obsolete as VCR’s and record players.
I reach only a few thousand people writing for my home town newspaper, but I reach tens of thousands, all over the globe, writing for a few Web sites.
From The “Guardian Unlimited”:
“For centuries, readers thumbed through the crackling pages of Sweden’s Post-och Inrikes Tidningar newspaper. No longer. The world’s oldest paper still in circulation has dropped its paper edition and now exists only in cyberspace. The newspaper, founded in 1645 by Sweden’s Queen Kristina, became a Web-only publication on Jan. 1. It’s a fate, many ink-stained writers and readers fear, that may await many of the world’s most venerable journals.”
The handwriting is on the pages of cyberspace: The days of the newspaper are numbered. Soon the venerable “New York Times” will have to change its motto to: All the news fit for cyberspace.
Newspapers are a relic from a bygone era when folks could leisurely read the newspaper while they ate their eggs, bacon and toast. Today folks gobble a Pop Tart while they glance at the Drudge Report or Mensnewsdaily.com.
Only the Internet can keep up with news that changes in the blink of an eye. News sites can be updated and edited countless times throughout the day and night, but a newspaper is “old news” by the time it reaches your doorstep.
Newspapers will always have a special place in my heart, but my brain knows that the Internet is where most people turn to for the latest news.
I write a weekly column for a small town newspaper in Virginia, and I also write for several Web sites. Please leave a comment or send me an email at: rreyes4966@aol.com | More from Robert Paul Reyes
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February 6th, 2007 at 2:00 am
I hope newspapers don’t become obsolete in my lifetime. I do get a lot of my news online, but I still enjoy reading a physical newspaper. And when I am looking at the ads, nothing beats being able to CIRCLE whatever it is that I’m interested in (be it real estate or furniture, etc…). Sometimes reading from a computer screen for too long hurts my eyes, so the newsprint is a relief. And since I do not have a laptop computer, I couldn’t take the paper with me wherever I went like I could now. I’d be rooted to my desk.
February 6th, 2007 at 4:22 am
While I tend to roll my eyes when traditional journalists harp and carry on about standards of journalism in blogs and dismiss the blogosphere, there is a mustard seed of truth to some of their criticisms of much of the online community.
Newspapers have history, corporate memory and tradition behind them which many online news sites are only beginning to acquire and there is more to the tradition of producing a single edition per day than the limitations of print. A journalist can only produce so many column inches per day and attempting to create a business that churns out news and updates 24/7 strikes me as enormously expensive and pretty much unnecessary.
Keep in mind that many news sites, such as Google, Yahoo! (and MND) are news aggregators. MND is an excellent source for news, but the vast majority of original work is editorial in nature rather than investigative.
IMO, the paper edition of many newspapers will likely survive at least until electronic paper becomes a practical method for distributing news. Laptops are really too cumbersone and expensive to serve as a replacement for reading the local tabloid on the train (I curse those fools who try to read a broadsheet in a peak hour train) and PDAs don’t really have the physical size to do the job.
It will happen as Robert describes but I don’t think it will be quite as soon as his article implies.
February 6th, 2007 at 5:14 am
All I can say is that I cannot even remember reading anything worht the effort in my local paper. I know they are so politically correct that they will not even print real news.
I remember having a story. CPS had threatened the woman with loss of her children if she did not accuse her husband of attempted murder. The woman didn’t submit to the extortion. CPS took the children. The children were both bitten by a vicious dog while in custody of CPS foster parents. It gets worse. CPS concealed the injuries and did not give the children proper medical care. The injuries were not discovered until after a judge ordered the children returned home. The injuries were infected and untreated.
I was incredulous when the Newspaper refused to touch the story. They didn’t think it would send the “right message.” They were protecting the misconduct by CPS. The story got out only because a local TV Station picked it up.
My humble opinion is that loss of newspapers would be no loss at all. Good riddance.
February 6th, 2007 at 5:43 am
Sorry gang, but reading the paper news is 2 days old. I want to know whats going on right now and also internationaly. Thoses that hate the Internet News and blogs seem to have lost control as the truth comes out so quickly. Biggest example was Dan Rathers feeble attempt to influance a Presidential election with false info..
They have a harder time lieing to us and it’s driving them crazy. I love it.
February 6th, 2007 at 7:06 am
I will lament the loss of newspapers. They work very well for catching whiskers when shaving, helping to prevent the drain from clogging, all with no need to clean the bathroom sink when finished. Just crumple it up and throw it away. They do waste a lot of valuable space in my trash can though.
But I’m not convinced they are all doomed. One or two might decide spinning for the cause doesn’t sell anymore, possibly even deciding to do some real investigative journalism, and maybe, just maybe, print something besides propaganda. CPS sounds like an excellent place to start down that path.
Meanwhile, unless and until they either free themselves from their self-imposed curtailment of free speech or go down the drain themselves, they will be limited to serving as whisker receptacles for me.
February 6th, 2007 at 8:31 am
I am 48 and grew up when there was only NBC,CBS,ABC and in my area the LA Times and Herald Examiner (out of business). In other words, I grew up having the liberal/leftwing notion of things shoved down my throat. Thank God for the Internet and it’s loosening the lib/left stranglehold on information the public has access to. I no longer watch any of the network news programs and I get the choice of what newspapers I want to read courtesy of the ‘net.
February 6th, 2007 at 9:09 am
i am 58. in the 50’s we had just 3 tv channels and the local rag. it was almost impossible to NOT grow liberal. it hit me at about the age of 30. that would be late 70’s. i have not bought a newspaper in over 8 years. stopped when i got divorced. i admit its fun to check out the sports section now and then but thats about it. as long as half of this sorry ass country tilts left, however, there will be buyers for newspapers.
February 6th, 2007 at 10:30 am
The sooner we take away the power of these rags mostly dominated by liberal thought the better.
February 6th, 2007 at 7:18 pm
Newspapers have long been obsolete for those wanting to know all that is happening in the world around us and why, not just what the publisher and editorial staff want us to think is happening.
February 7th, 2007 at 11:33 pm
New York Times Publisher:
“I really don’t know whether we’ll be printing the Times in five years, and you know what? I don’t care either,” he says.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/822775.html
The New York Times is the most influential, respected and balanced newspaper in the world. If they go “Internet Only” in a few years, there is no hope for any other newspaper.