Sorry, New York Times and WaPo Staffers, Here's Your Future...

Henry Blodget | April 28, 2008 9:38 AM

newyorktimestitanic.jpgA newspaper in Madison, Wisconsin, just took the step that many newspapers will be forced to take over the next decade, many sooner rather than later: It shut down its print business, fired a third of its staff, and restructured its business to focus exclusively online. We think similar fates will eventually befall most properties owned by the New York Times (NYT), Washington Post (WPO), Gannett, (GCI), et al.

The New York Times reports:

On Saturday, The Capital Times, the city’s fabled 90-year-old daily newspaper founded in response to the jingoist fervor of World War I, stopped printing to devote itself to publishing its daily report on the Web...

in recent years, the paper’s circulation dropped to about 18,000 from a high in the 1960s of more than 40,000. “We felt our audience was shrinking so that we were not relevant,” Clayton Frink, the publisher of The Capital Times, said in an interview two days before the final daily press run. “We are going a little farther, a little faster, but the general trend is happening everywhere.”

The transition in Madison, while long foretold — The Capital Times was doubly part of a dying breed, being the afternoon paper in a two-newspaper town — has hardly been neat and clean and cathartic.

More than 20 members of the newsroom staff lost their jobs, mainly through buyouts, but also through layoffs... The new staff total will be in the 40s. This includes seven new hires in areas like Web producing and arts coverage. Copy editors, by contrast, are “exiting at a higher rate than reporters.”

The Web strategy, while seen as a long-term solution, is still a work in progress... The Capital Times will operate a nearly continuous Web newsroom and focus on repurposing online the cultural and entertainment material the staff will begin to produce in the supplement, 77 Square, to be inserted in The State Journal.

With much hand-wringing, the New York Times is in the process of removing 100 of its 1,300 journalists (8%). Assuming the Capital Times' firing ratio (so far) holds for national papers, this means that the NYT will eventually have to whack at least 300 more newsroom staffers.

If and when the NYT does shut down its print version, our guess would be that the newsroom cuts will have to go even deeper.

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46 Comments

Peter Kafka said:
Important distinction here is that CapTimes was even more of an anachronism than most of its peers: It was an afternoon paper in a two-paper town. It was having trouble justifying its existence long before the the Web came around. Astonishing to see it cling to life for this long.
Henry Blodget said:
Good point. But likely only the reason it is the first...
Marc Siry (URL) said:
Where are the ecowarriors decrying the incredible waste in the entire newspaper product cycle- the paper, the ink, the shipping- all for a product that lasts a single day and is then discarded? Maybe they're out there and the newspapers just won't write about them.

I haven't touched a physical newspaper in years- I can't stand the ink smudging on my hands- but I am an avid NY Times reader, mostly on my BlackBerry.

Paper version gone? Good riddance, in my book (or my e-book, as the case may be).



Henry Blodget said:
Couldn't agree more, Marc. It's horrifying.
Bjorn Tipling (URL) said:
Did you guys read this? It's pretty relevant.

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003795106
Edoardo Piccolotto (URL) said:
This post makes me remember a post that I have written various months ago, about what happened to the San Francisco Chronicle. Anyway the doom of the printed newspaper business is doomed. here is the link of the post. http://www.aninternetvoice.com/?p=12
Jim Hughes said:
Henry:

I think you should 'bundle' the three separate posts SAI put up today, which are really (in my opinion) all part of the same story: How People Used to Get Their News vs. How People Are Now Getting Their News (and Will Continue To Do So In The Future):
(feel free to clean up links)
1) Sorry, New York Times and WaPo Staffers, Here's Your Future...
http://www.alleyinsider.com/2008/4/sorry_new_york_times_and_wapo_staffers_here_s_your_future_
2) WSJ Gains, NYT Loses Circulation Over Last 6 Months...
http://www.alleyinsider.com/2008/4/wsj_gains_nyt_loses_circulation_over_last_6_months
3) Failing Network News Model: Not Katie's Fault...
http://www.alleyinsider.com/2008/4/failing_network_news_model_not_katie_s_fault

I've always been fascinated by this description of the daily process that news editors go through: "we have to decide what we think people SHOULD know, and what we think people WANT to know."

Until fairly recently, there was a mostly finite space in which to deliver those two types of stories: the (your) daily newspaper, and the nightly news broadcasts of 22 minutes. New technologies (cable, satellite delivery / expanded channel universe) and yes, the Internet and subsequent satellite radio and wireless options have mostly removed the second part of that daily weighty equation - the part about what people WANT to know. Many now have multiple means of accessing what they want to know (including controlling the "when they want to"), that are outside of their local print vehicles and the dinner-hour broadcasts.

But all combined, nothing really new:

See: Richard Tomkins: The death of truth
By Richard Tomkins, FT.com site
Published: May 09, 2005
http://search.ft.com/ftArticle?ct=0&amp;id=050509007771
referencing Philip Meyer's book "The Vanishing Newspaper: Saving Journalism in the Information Age" -- in which Meyer predicts that the LAST printed newspaper will be history in 2040 -- April of 2040 to be exact. The Captial Times may have just kicked off that 32 year (to the month!) countdown...

Re: the circulation story, note that the only two "increases" were those two papers (USA Today and WSJ) that not only have more of a national 'footprint' (debatable I know of WSJ but more the case w/them than NYT or WaPo -- IMHO) but I wonder what percentage of those 'increases' that are really so slight might be represented by the distro deals those two gainers have with hotels, etc. (what percentage of each are actually delivered to individuals / addresses)? In ALL instances after that, EVERY SINGLE one of these - local - newspapers is declining (see above).

Finally, while still visiting the year 2005, see the excellent article written by Merrill Brown :
"Abandoning the News" by Merrill Brown
http://www.carnegie.org/reporter/10/news/index.html

Bottom line: this is / has all been playing out for a while now, and has been predicted by many. But there are some industries too wedded to their old business models to see outside of them.

The (great?) irony amidst all this? I believe people today are better informed, have more access to more relevant information and news than ever...and that will continue to improve! And some companies will embrace / adapt; some will spring up anew...and some will die. Period.

Thanks for letting me rant; I enjoy SAI and haven't posted before, but this is a topic I do follow and care passionately about!
Cheers,
Jim Hughes
P.S. erm...if they ever release the subscription-to-which-branded-publishers info, you might be able to 'bundle' Kindle stories with this set as well!








Tom Kessler (URL) said:
Couldn't agree more with Henry. Why do newspapers persist in cutting editorial staff when intellectual assets are the only thing of value in a digital world? Unless your truck is brown or says “FedEx” on the side, you really shouldn’t be dropping anything on my doorstep – your economics don’t justify it.

Also, Marc Siry is spot on. For years newspapers have had research that showed that their customers actually feel guilty tripping over a stack of unread papers. So on top of its other problems, the industry is now faced with a core product that is horribly inefficient in an increasingly eco-aware world.

That said, if newspapers could rattle their culture and show absolute faith in the value of professional journalism, they still could save the day. Any thought that user-generated content will attract major advertisers over the long haul is a pure delusion – just look at the turnover in the sales staff at these companies. But the only way out requires an act of faith that seems well beyond the newspaper industry.
Kelp said:
Eco-journalism will be it's own punishment, because someday soon, eco-journalists will be fretting over the billions of free electrons enslaved (and no-doubt contributing to global warming because of the fossil fuels consumed to generate them) that are being wasted each day by blog readers making endless comments about endless comments about endless comments about endless comments...

But I digress.

Physical newspapers are dead.
Television news is over.
The skills taught in Journalism schools today are akin to medical schools still teaching about eye of newt, leeches, and magic spells.

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