Kerry to hold hearing on future of newspapers in his Commerce subcommittee

[karynnj]

Senator John F. Kerry will hold hearings in Washington next week on the financial problems facing the newspaper industry, as dwindling advertising dollars push many US papers to the brink of closure.

The hearings by the Senate Commerce Committee, beginning April 30, are the latest effort in the nation's capital to help out newspapers. Senator Benjamin L. Cardin, Democrat of Maryland, introduced a bill last month that would enable newspaper companies to restructure as nonprofits.

<snip>

"America's newspapers are struggling to survive and while there will be serious consequences in terms of the lives and financial security of the employees involved, including hundreds at the Globe, there will also be serious consequences for our democracy where diversity of opinion and strong debate are paramount," Kerry wrote in a letter sent to union leaders Friday. The union released the letter yesterday.

The increase in media conglomerates has resulted in an increase in agenda-driven reporting and over time, if those of us who value a diversity of opinion and ideas, and are unafraid to be confronted with pointed commentary and analysis, do not act, it is a situation which will only get worse," Kerry wrote. The senator has received political endorsements over the years from the Globe's editorial page, which is operated separately from its news-gathering operation.

http://www.boston.com/business/articles/2009/04/20/us_senate_panel_to_look_at_future_of_newspapers/

This should be a fascinating hearing. Though the article of course focuses on the BG, many major papers have failed or are near failing, Papers representing chains are shrinking in size and contain more and more AP articles - even on important issues in their own state or city. When even the NYT is concerned about its future, there is a major problem. ( Note that even here where Kerry is acting in their support, the BG writers try to water down his very strong defense of an independent press by pointing out they have endorsed him.)

Here is a link explaining more about Senator Cardin's idea about etting them become non-profits. http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2009/04/20/a_hybrid_path_for_saving_newspapers/

Posted in LBN
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x3839741

[wisteria]

1. I really don't hold out much hope for paper news.

What they need to do is start to slowly bring their news on line and charge to access it. I never receive my newspaper with anything but old news in it and if it wasn't for the coupons and commentary it wouldn't be worth receiving it at all.

[karynnj]

2. I agree that what needs to be saved is the "content" of the newspaper, not the way it is delivered

The problem is that the "newspapers" do not get enough revenue from the online content. Someone on Blue Mass Group wrote that the number of unique viewers of Boston.com was significantly less than Daily Kos. Daily Kos's revenue from ads provides enough money to sustain the site and support Markos period.

Even eliminating all employees involved in printing and selling the paper the number of salaries that a major paper needs to support is too high to be sustained by the current way the internet handles news. The other thing is that because the content is all there now for free, changing that is really really hard and clearly can't be done unilaterally by any paper. The NYT tried a few years back putting it's columns behind a firewall available to those who paid only. It clearly was unpopular here and it must have been unsuccessful because they ended that. It may take an industry wide solutions and it might take the legislators to help.

[beachmom]

3. FYI: this article was cited on the front page of TPM in the Financial Wires section.

First time I have seen Kerry mentioned on the blogs in months.

There is more to it than media conglomerates. There are so many causes to the problem, most notably (let's face it), that we are reading their articles for free and advertising on line is not as lucrative as ad revenue in paper (plus people have to pay for the paper).

There is no way I can go back to reading a newspaper in dead tree form. Half of it doesn't interest me, it costs too much, is environmentally bad, and even the size of it plus getting black ink on your fingers is annoying. I do still read magazines on paper -- Time and The Atlantic -- because they are nice to hold and manageable to read (the computer can hurt my eyes) during quiet times when I have all media off. But the newspaper is going away, and we will go through a period where little will be replacing it.

[beachmom]

4. Jeff Jarvis from buzzmachine.com (and author of "What Would Google Do") has

a mock testimony up, in case he is asked to come to the hearing. I actually think Jeff would be a nice dissenting opinion from the doom and gloom most have about what is happening to newspapers.

http://www.buzzmachine.com/2009/04/21/my-testimony-to-sen-kerry/#comment-393500

I don't necessarily believe Jeff that it is all going to be alright. But I also think a new reality will emerge that is not as bad as we think it is going to be.

[beachmom]

5. Wow. I had no idea how bad it was for the Globe:

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003966601

According to ABC, for 395 newspapers reporting this spring, daily circulation fell 7% to 34,439,713 copies, compared with the same March period in 2008. On Sunday, for 557 newspapers, circulation was down 5.3% to 42,082,707. These averages do not include 84 newspapers with circulations below 50,000 due to a change in publishing frequency.

The percent comparisons are for the same period ending in March 2008. (All daily averages are for Monday through Friday.)

Daily circulation at The New York Times dropped 3.5% to 1,039,031. The Times' Sunday circ was down 1.7% to 1,451,233.

The Washington Post lost 1.6% of its daily circ to 665,383 and 2.3% to 868,965.

USA Today, as reported earlier this month, lost 7.4% of its daily circulation to 2,113,725 due to a decline in hotel copies.

Daily circulation at The Wall Street Journal was up a fraction 0.6% to 2,082,189, but this was certainly the exception, not the rule.

Daily circulation at The Boston Globe skidded 13.6% to 302,638 copies. Sunday decreased 11.2% to 466,665.

It's a blood bath for them. I thought they declined some, and had some expense and finance issues. But such trends are unsustainable. The only newspaper worse? My hometown's:

Daily circulation at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution plummeted almost 20% to 261,828. Sunday decreased 7% to 462,011.

I am curious about this hearing Kerry is holding. My only fear is that it doesn't dwell on old fuddy duddy stuff in this internet age. The truth is the news printed on paper is old fashioned and is going to end. What concerns me is that they constantly cut GOOD staff who do investigative reporting and beat reporting about local issues. That is what we need, not dead trees being delivered on our driveway and certainly not re-printed AP reports we can get elsewhere. I am sure that Senator Kerry reads the Globe in paper form. I just hope he understands that is a quaint way of getting the news these days.

[beachmom]

6. Short video of Kerry answering questions on NECN:

http://www.necn.com/Boston/Business/2009/04/27/Kerry-calls-hearing-on/1240851903.html

[karynnj]

7. It will be interesting to see the witness list

I also am not that convinced Kerry does read the Boston Globe on paper. He is in DC half the time so that would likely be difficult. He does not seem technology phobic. Can you get it on a blackberry? He's constantly looking at one of those. I seriously doubt that he is blind to the changes in how people get their news - not to mention, his staff would likely feel very comfortable telling him what you did.

Those numbers are awful and worse than I thought. I have heard a NYT editor describe how bad their situation (which is far better than the BG) is. They desperately need a new business model. The internet now does not have the ability to support a news organization if they dropped newsprint - the NYT tried charging for some of their content, but that failed.

[beachmom]

8. I bet you he gets a BG delivered. I know he reads the NYT & WP

and at least during the presidential campaign read them in paper form. I agree with you that he also gets news from his blackberry, computer, etc. I am just saying that no doubt he starts his day with newspapers in paper form. It is one of the luxuries of politics being his job -- he can justify the expense in a way I cannot when I can get it for free on line. So I see him and other people keeping one foot in the Old Media world and the other in the New Media world. I don't think they totally comprehend MY world, where I receive no paper newspapers. I do read a couple of magazines, but those are much, much cheaper than a newspaper which costs hundreds of dollars a year.

There have been ideas thrown around about making micropayments for articles. That appeals to Old Media types. Not sure it is possible in the real world. I really hope he brings in somebody like Jeff Jarvis or some other expert in the new media world where paper plays no role, nor paid subscriptions. I am NOT saying Jarvis is 100% right; just that his approach (it doesn't have to be him, just someone who has his general world view) should be a voice in the discussion.

[karynnj]

9. I agree 100% with your last paragraph

especially in light of other things you said in prior posts. I think that the "content" of a paper is what needs to be preserved and that has already declined in quality over the past several years. I was shocked when I noticed how often the BG used the AP story even for things that took place in Boston.

[karynnj]

10. Here's a nice article from Northwestern University's graduate journalism department

By the way, the hearing title refers to "journalism" not "newspapers". I hope that is significant, not just that they are treated as synonyms.

In discussing the future of the Boston Globe, this article does consider the possibility of it being on-line only, but the problem is that nearly all the income is from the print newspapers.

"Among possible outcomes for the Globe are coming to terms with the $20 million in concessions, further reducing its staff and scaling back printing. The newspaper could also find a buyer that would support its cost structure or look to alternative business models.

One such model is an all-online operation, which Nieman’s Benton said may not be worth it when nearly all of the Globe’s revenue comes from print circulation.

Boston.com is strong asset, he continued, “but not the type of asset that could keep the Globe newsroom operating as it did historically…If they went online, they would have to completely gut the newsroom.”

Parker, who is an economist by training and cofounder of Mother Jones Magazine, also expressed concern over an entirely online model. While there is an initial burst of traffic to an online news site, visitors fall of drastically shortly thereafter, he explained. "

http://news.medill.northwestern.edu/washington/news.aspx?id=127807

(As to the comment worrying that the Globe might be biased to legislators who help them, all they need to see is the biased BG article on Kerry's hearing and the fact that they then printed 2 LTTE bashing Kerry for something that was not true. It would be nice if they just covered the good things he does even half the time.)