The US could end up doing what's happened here with regional papers. The Whitby Gazette here is now edited and printed by the Scarborough News, and both the WG and the SN is a generic Yorkshire Regional Newspapers product, with everything after the centre page common content. The online content is worse - the WhitbyGazette website redirects to the Scarborough News, not even just serving the same content from a different domain.
You are likely to end up with The Podunk Post being idential to the Misouri Messenger with just the outer page changed to have the local brand on the front and the local sports on the back.
Yep, the revenue generator for local and regiuonal papers was always the classifieds. They're now on Autotrader, Monster, Gumtree etc. There's simply not the revenue any more.
The hyper-local not-one-offs has gone to specialist advertising. The one-offs has gone to online.
I have here The Whitby Advertiser, a free monthly booklet delivered to about 20,000 letterboxes. It is 72 pages of advertising and four pages of editorial. The advertising is all hyper-local regular purchase things mixed with stuff targetted to tourists who will pick up a copy in their holiday cottage. So, local denture clinic, local chimney sweepers, local retirement home, local mobility scooter, plus local tea shop, local cinema, local tea dance.
Turning to the weekly Gazette, the adverts are Teesside Airport, travel insurance, patio flower seed kits, old people shoes - the stuff you get in the back pages of the Sunday Express. The classifieds is down to one page of death notices and council regulation notices, legal requirements.
somewhat off topic but; THE F@$&*@#!KING ECONOMIST ; in my youth a delightfully skeptical paper what gored every sides sacred cows, now the most pusillanimous barker up the world eco forum wank fest tree. heard they got sold to pearsons back in the late90s or early naughts; but good lord in heaven they be one stinky turd in these times that could be helped by newspapers that were not utter refuse.
Before the Times started its move into Guardian territory, we had two “serious” papers of the right in Britain - it and the Telegraph. The former grander and more serious, the true “top nobs” paper, and the latter aimed a notch down the class ladder but still very much aimed at the literate and educated classes. I started with the DT as a teenager in the 70s (it was my dad’s lifelong paper), moved to the Times for a quarter of a century plus as a graduate professional - where I first encountered Mr Worstall - and have come back home to the DT as the Times increasingly alienated me.
So if the U.K. market of say 60 million can sustain that then there must surely be room for 2 top nobs papers of the left in a country of 380million; there’s no reason why the NYT should have a natural monopoly. Sure the WAPO needs to differentiate itself in terms of style and tone, a la Times v DT in the past or Times v Graun today, but the journalists there need to recognise that and get on with it. Compete or survive. I guess that’s what the importation of the British ex DT interlopers is all about.
It's a bit late for the newspaper owners to notice IMHO. Quite a lot of this has already happened
The NY Post and the Daily Mail between them have probably already seized the lower end of the right of center market in the US. Something like the Epoch Times maybe could seize the higher brow part. In what I consider to be an oddly timed coincidence the publisher of the Epoch Times has just been arrested by the FBI for bribery/corruption charges.
The NY Times has probably nabbed the High end left market. USA Today may have the lower end (not sure about that)
If the owner and publisher of the WaPo were willing he could certainly seize the high end of the Center right market but to do so the WaPo would need to replace approximately 100% of its current journalists
The US could end up doing what's happened here with regional papers. The Whitby Gazette here is now edited and printed by the Scarborough News, and both the WG and the SN is a generic Yorkshire Regional Newspapers product, with everything after the centre page common content. The online content is worse - the WhitbyGazette website redirects to the Scarborough News, not even just serving the same content from a different domain.
You are likely to end up with The Podunk Post being idential to the Misouri Messenger with just the outer page changed to have the local brand on the front and the local sports on the back.
Yep, the revenue generator for local and regiuonal papers was always the classifieds. They're now on Autotrader, Monster, Gumtree etc. There's simply not the revenue any more.
The hyper-local not-one-offs has gone to specialist advertising. The one-offs has gone to online.
I have here The Whitby Advertiser, a free monthly booklet delivered to about 20,000 letterboxes. It is 72 pages of advertising and four pages of editorial. The advertising is all hyper-local regular purchase things mixed with stuff targetted to tourists who will pick up a copy in their holiday cottage. So, local denture clinic, local chimney sweepers, local retirement home, local mobility scooter, plus local tea shop, local cinema, local tea dance.
Turning to the weekly Gazette, the adverts are Teesside Airport, travel insurance, patio flower seed kits, old people shoes - the stuff you get in the back pages of the Sunday Express. The classifieds is down to one page of death notices and council regulation notices, legal requirements.
somewhat off topic but; THE F@$&*@#!KING ECONOMIST ; in my youth a delightfully skeptical paper what gored every sides sacred cows, now the most pusillanimous barker up the world eco forum wank fest tree. heard they got sold to pearsons back in the late90s or early naughts; but good lord in heaven they be one stinky turd in these times that could be helped by newspapers that were not utter refuse.
A distinct sympathy with this view.....
"Mail, Express, and, umm, can’t think of our lefty one there"
Ah, did Eddie Shah try with Today? Can't remember.
Before the Times started its move into Guardian territory, we had two “serious” papers of the right in Britain - it and the Telegraph. The former grander and more serious, the true “top nobs” paper, and the latter aimed a notch down the class ladder but still very much aimed at the literate and educated classes. I started with the DT as a teenager in the 70s (it was my dad’s lifelong paper), moved to the Times for a quarter of a century plus as a graduate professional - where I first encountered Mr Worstall - and have come back home to the DT as the Times increasingly alienated me.
So if the U.K. market of say 60 million can sustain that then there must surely be room for 2 top nobs papers of the left in a country of 380million; there’s no reason why the NYT should have a natural monopoly. Sure the WAPO needs to differentiate itself in terms of style and tone, a la Times v DT in the past or Times v Graun today, but the journalists there need to recognise that and get on with it. Compete or survive. I guess that’s what the importation of the British ex DT interlopers is all about.
It's a bit late for the newspaper owners to notice IMHO. Quite a lot of this has already happened
The NY Post and the Daily Mail between them have probably already seized the lower end of the right of center market in the US. Something like the Epoch Times maybe could seize the higher brow part. In what I consider to be an oddly timed coincidence the publisher of the Epoch Times has just been arrested by the FBI for bribery/corruption charges.
The NY Times has probably nabbed the High end left market. USA Today may have the lower end (not sure about that)
If the owner and publisher of the WaPo were willing he could certainly seize the high end of the Center right market but to do so the WaPo would need to replace approximately 100% of its current journalists
Other than Megan, but yes, replacement.....