I've bashed the local morning paper for quite some time, but lately I'm beginning to feel sorry for their plight. Our own Midland Reporter-Telegram was once a great local paper. But like all the others, they're struggling with the competition from online news sources. The classified ads are a fraction of that they used to be. They are still getting advertising from the car dealers and retail stores. But on most days it seems that there is more space occupied by ads than there is by news. And the news mainly comes from wire services. It's as if they are operating with a skeleton staff in the newsroom.
They are in survival mode. It's a Hearst property, and for all I know, the home office is cannibalizing the small newspapers out here in flyover country. I'm not enough of a visionary to see any positive developments on the horizon. But we can hope that they'll come up with something other than jacking up the subscription price on the remaining customers.
Meanwhile, here's a development that seems counterproductive: Denver Post journalists are revolting against the new owner.
And here's Barton Swaim who is nostalgic for a paper newspaper: In Praise of the News on Paper. It's behind the wsj.com paywall, but as of the time of this writing you could read it at investorvillage.com.
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2:49 PM 4/23/2018
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