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Newspaper Ad Revenues Fall to 50-Year Low in 2011

mjperry.blogspot.com

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Re: Newspaper Ad Revenues Fall to 50-Year Low in 2011

#11

Post by InclinedPlane »

Cushman wrote: post #6
patio11 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The really "Holy cow" bit for me is that even if you add the online revenue back in, the graph is virtually identical. If you had asked me this morning about the future of print newspapers, I would have said "Totally toast, of course, but savvy ones will move online." If you ask me now, I'd say "Totally toast. Your children may recognize the names of a couple of them, if they happen to regularly visit one of a handfu…

And I'd be happy to say "Serves them right," but the real tragedy here is that with them dies the very idea that journalism is a service worth paying money for. At least we're outsourcing manufacturing to professionals...

It does serve them right. As a rule they abandoned the helm of serious journalism years ago and have largely engaged in shallow pursuits that generate easy money since then. The amount of money spent on serious journalism at newspapers engage is so incredibly tiny it might as well be non-existent.

Re: Newspaper Ad Revenues Fall to 50-Year Low in 2011

#12

Post by alexlitov »

It's unfortunate that local newspapers' online presence is pretty pathetic. Most of the articles posted resemble amateur blog posts - lacking real journalism, containing grammatical errors that would have been spotted if someone proofread the article before hitting submit.

SFgate.com, I am looking at you.

Re: Newspaper Ad Revenues Fall to 50-Year Low in 2011

#13

Post by nextparadigms »

patio11 wrote: post #4
Cushman wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Was it easy to imagine printed news coming back before seeing the graph? (Snark aside, it's a good point-- there must be similar graphs for the ice or telegram industries, to name two. Could make a pretty cool art installation or something.)

The really "Holy cow" bit for me is that even if you add the online revenue back in, the graph is virtually identical. If you had asked me this morning about the future of print newspapers, I would have said "Totally toast, of course, but savvy ones will move online." If you ask me now, I'd say "Totally toast. Your children may recognize the names of a couple of them, if they happen to regularly visit one of a handfu…

> but savvy ones will move online.

Did you expect the savvy ones to be more than 50% of the players? Only a minority of them will move successfully online, but they have no one to blame but themselves. This is common with most disruptions.

Re: Newspaper Ad Revenues Fall to 50-Year Low in 2011

#14

Post by pagekalisedown »

alexlitov wrote: post #12

It's unfortunate that local newspapers' online presence is pretty pathetic. Most of the articles posted resemble amateur blog posts - lacking real journalism, containing grammatical errors that would have been spotted if someone proofread the article before hitting submit. SFgate.com, I am looking at you.

5 years from now, I have a feeling SFgate.com will be like today's digg.com

Re: Newspaper Ad Revenues Fall to 50-Year Low in 2011

#15

Post by chc »

patio11 wrote: post #4
Cushman wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Was it easy to imagine printed news coming back before seeing the graph? (Snark aside, it's a good point-- there must be similar graphs for the ice or telegram industries, to name two. Could make a pretty cool art installation or something.)

The really "Holy cow" bit for me is that even if you add the online revenue back in, the graph is virtually identical. If you had asked me this morning about the future of print newspapers, I would have said "Totally toast, of course, but savvy ones will move online." If you ask me now, I'd say "Totally toast. Your children may recognize the names of a couple of them, if they happen to regularly visit one of a handfu…

As somebody actually in the newspaper industry, I've been telling everyone who will listen for years now that the future of news does not look like newspapers, not even online ones. The idea of an "online newspaper" is like a horse-drawn carriage with mechanical horses are powered by gasoline — it obviously should be a car, but that's what you'd end up with if you were too tied to the idea of horses to let it go.

The trouble for newspapers is that they're used to having a certain scale and mode of operation. The future of news is small teams running a website with little of the ceremonious structure that defines a newspaper. As long as they're lean, they'll be able to take in enough revenue to keep writers living like writers mostly do today. But I don't think there's any way to squeeze the New York Times into that shape.

Re: Newspaper Ad Revenues Fall to 50-Year Low in 2011

#18

Post by ars »

This doesn't seem as dramatic to me as others are finding it.

The 1950's seem to me like they would be a high point for newspapers (every book and movie set in those years has newspapers quite prominently, and wikipedia says that papers per person peaked in 1950). The years after that look like outliers actually, and now things are simply returning to normal.

But to make a true examination I would really like to see a graph going further back (to 1900, and even better to 1850), and I would like to see a graph adjusted per capita (per household, not person).

Re: Newspaper Ad Revenues Fall to 50-Year Low in 2011

#19

Post by nodata »

pg wrote: post #2

That is a really dramatic graph. It's hard to imagine an industry coming back from something like that.

So, does this graph show that companies spend the same amount of inflation-adjusted dollars on newspaper advertising as they did in 1950? Were things good back then? What happened before the 50s?

Re: Newspaper Ad Revenues Fall to 50-Year Low in 2011

#20

Post by rmc »

chc wrote: post #15
patio11 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The really "Holy cow" bit for me is that even if you add the online revenue back in, the graph is virtually identical. If you had asked me this morning about the future of print newspapers, I would have said "Totally toast, of course, but savvy ones will move online." If you ask me now, I'd say "Totally toast. Your children may recognize the names of a couple of them, if they happen to regularly visit one of a handfu…

As somebody actually in the newspaper industry, I've been telling everyone who will listen for years now that the future of news does not look like newspapers, not even online ones. The idea of an "online newspaper" is like a horse-drawn carriage with mechanical horses are powered by gasoline — it obviously should be a car, but that's what you'd end up with if you were too tied to the idea of horses to let it go. The…

What's your idea of the future of news?
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