Monday, October 27, 2008

Practical advice for people who want to accelerate the newspaper crash of 2009

With revenue from newspaper advertising in freefall and print readership in decline, 2008 was absolutely the worst possible time for newspapers to turn off half their subscriber base by becoming a propaganda arm of the Democratic party.

For its part, McClatchy has stopped trying to hide its Obama boosterism. And just about everybody has noticed the media's pro-Obama tilt -- judging by the comments on my blog and the emails I receive, alot of newspaper subscribers are disgusted. Tim Oren has also had it with newspapers who've abandoned their traditional role of informing the electorate by giving all sides of political issues. If you are looking for practical things you can do to hurry along the Coming Collapse, Oren has some practical ideas.
  • Cancel your subscriptions, if you haven't already.

  • If you buy advertising, move it to the Internet, and find out how to meet your customers 1-1.

  • Keep your ads and clicks away from Internet properties owned by the papers, e.g., Careerbuilder, cars.com and about.com.

  • Should you provide product or service to a newspaper, cut their credit or demand cash up front. You'll find plenty of reasons that this is prudent business.

  • Help an older person find what they need online instead; they're nearly the only demographic the papers have left.
Previous:
Sacramento Bee's circulation is hemorrhaging
Report: paid subscriptions at The Olympian are down 1,000 over the past year
Report: Media coverage of McCain is overwhelmingly negative
Journalist covering Obama event was overheard squealing "He touched me!" as she left the ballroom
Rasmussen: 55% say media is more biased this year in election
McClatchy bureau chief says McClatchy doesn't need to report both sides fairly

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I stumbled across your site while making the decision to cancel my subscription to the Wichita Eagle. McClatchy acquired the Eagle in 2006. As a Knight-Ridder publication, the Eagle was already left-leaning, thanks to Davis Merritt and his belief in advocacy (community) journalism, which I think has contributed to the erosion of journalism standards in this country. The Eagle hasn't endorsed Obama yet, but I don't doubt that it will. Gov. Sebelius is an Obama acolyte and the Eagle serves as her diary and daybook.

I have a degree in journalism (from another era - the '70s) and so it is hard to watch the complete implosion of the traditional media. I turned off broadcast TV news in 2004 and local TV news this year. I stopped my subscription to Time many years ago.

God help our country.