Wired News: Newspapers Should Really Worry
I’ve subscribed to the Charlotte Observer a few times. Every time I decide to let my subscription lapse and every time it is for the same reason: I feel guilty when I don’t read a paper one day. I know I’ve paid for it, I know a tree has died for it. I know that I will get another paper tomorrow and will not have time to go back and hit the unread, unopened paper laying in the recycling bin. And even when I do read them all, the growing pile of recyclables still bothers me. Looks like I’m not alone.
Imagine what higher-ups at the Post must have thought when focus-group participants declared they wouldn’t accept a Washington Post subscription even if it were free. The main reason (and I’m not making this up): They didn’t like the idea of old newspapers piling up in their houses.
Wired News: Newspapers Should Really Worry
I still prefer the “sit at the table/on the sofa and read” method to scrolling and clicking from this chair but until I have a Tablet PC, I can either buy a paper or go online for the news. Eventually, when I have a Tablet, I’ll be able to sit on the sofa and read a PDF or HTML version of the paper. I wouldn’t mind subscribing to it at all, if it were the entire paper every day. There is no way I would pay for the same thing if I have to read it on this monitor, though. I just can’t do it.
Newpaper companies are getting worried and things are only going to get worse for them. Will they go the RIAA/MPAA route and destroy everything in sight in order to cling to the past? Will they go the Fox News Network/CNN route and opt for entertainment instead of information? Or will they play to their strengths and play off of the streangths of the media change of guard, transforming into news sources more powerful and widespread than could have been imagined by their founders?
Smart men would choose the latter. We’ll see how smart Knight-Ridder and the rest are in the next few years.