The problem with newspapers (and their cousins Tv)

Dick Tracy. Three newspapers in each city. News that made sense. enough content for an entire family to read.

Today, newspapers are a shell of themselves.

The biggest problem with newspapers is that there are more newspapers. Almost all local newspapers have become the locales of USA Today. There are 500 places where I can find all the latest news about Brad and Angelina as well as Natalee Holloway. These include many national magazines and newspapers, a dozen cable channels and, more recently, the Internet. What I can not find it in 500 places in depth local news, local investigative journalism, and thought leadership does not pander.

Newspapers should be more than they can be: the investigators, the protectors of truth, and guardians of the little guy. Newspapers can claim to be these things, but the reality is that it can no longer be part of the mission, as the company also owns television stations, radio stations, newspapers and shopper-type, all of which are promoting their public a priority absolute. It starts at the top people, if the President and the Board have the courage, the publisher will have courage, publishers have the balls, and support to journalists who have courage.

But its hard to be brave when the only commonality between all the properties of the media is the fact that they depend on advertising. It was easier for the cards to resist the bullies when they had more influence and more readership, but now, the audience is business owners in broadcast, and broadcast by the Work with nature. When was the last time that NBC has worked as authoritative as a documentary "If Japan Can, Why Can not We?" The 1980?

I love newspapers. Raised in New York, there were nearly a dozen flavors of local newspapers tri-state area, each with a very special personality. The newspapers today seem to have unique personality is the consensus. There is no good or bad, right or wrong, win or lose. Look at the titles ... "Support for Gun Control Moon (second line), but still necessary, some say." I did this, but became a writing style very popular title. Nobody is right, no one is wrong, we do not want to offend anyone.

The ads are a vital source of income for newspapers, but it's hard to compete with Craig's List, which runs ads for free, and allows a lot of pictures (a much better apartment survey, as an example.)

This means that the display advertising and inserts are growth area of the newspaper. Only relevant, the content of fly-off-the-newsstand change the sinking of the Titanic.

That is why for our content, we subscribe to a dozen or more blogs. Which is a shame, because the newspaper is a thing do not blog - people of great experience, strong equity and portability of the product.

Chairpeople owners of multi-media I beg you: do not allow the death of newspapers to throw the whole weight behind the gloss. blow-dry feature charge 10:00 news. paper published in the dogs, and let it do what they should do: digging and reporting.