A conversation about the future of newspapers with Charlie Rose, Walter Isaacson of “Time,” Robert Thomson of “Wall Street Journal” and Mort Zuckerman of “The New York Daily News”
Charlie Rose, February 11, 2009 running time 27:01
Please use the comments to demonstrate your own ignorance, unfamiliarity with empirical data, ability to repeat discredited memes, and lack of respect for scientific knowledge. Also, be sure to create straw men and argue against things I have neither said nor even implied. Any irrelevancies you can mention will also be appreciated. Lastly, kindly forgo all civility in your discourse . . . you are, after all, anonymous.
"Overall household indebtedness is up from $7 trillion to almost $10 trillion since 2000. On this sum, we estimate, the American consumer has an annual interest bill of more than $500 billion; a sum, by the way, that vastly exceeds his current income growth." —Kurt Richebacher
Knowing that the vote over the weekend in Greece was really a referendum on Euro membership, a majority of the Greek Parliament said yes to staying. European Finance Ministers meet again on Wednesday to solidify the 2nd bailout package for Greece at the same time hopefully a deal is consummated between Greece and its creditors this week. The Greek 14.5b euro bond that matures on March 20th is up by 2 pts. The optimism that all will be completed and contained AGAIN to Greece has yields lower in Portugal, Spain and Italy. The iTraxx Financial Index is also narrower by...
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February 16th, 2009 at 8:36 pm
I was laid off on Friday from a supplier of software and services to the global newspaper industry. Sales have collapsed and service contracts are being cancelled worldwide. So I don’t need media moguls like Zuckerman talking his book on about the future of newspapers and newsmagazines.
I can tell you their future in one word: doomed. It is an 18th-century information distribution model, one that had an amazing 100+ year run, but one that is now horribly obsolete outside of the 3rd world. The general graphic arts/printing industry will consolidate and shrink, but printed, subscription ad-supported news media will not survive. The “big iron” printing press and post-press equipment manufacturers will not survive as independent entities, and neither will the pre-press software and services vendors. Niche magazines will be around longer, but are on borrowed time as advertisers finally realize that nobody gives a shit about their ads.
Actually, sales of printed news media in developing countries were rising quite rapidly as literacy rates in countries like India, Brazil and China rose and many people might not have the money for a computer and internet service but a lot do have a few rupees or reals to drop on the day’s paper. But that’s all on hold for now.
February 16th, 2009 at 11:08 pm
much like/for similiar reasons as Forty2, above, I didn’t bother with the vid itself..
though, something tells me that the daze of ‘Newspapers’ holding sway, as they have, over geographic regions, is, already clearing..
further, the *Future of, what’s left of, their model, will be trending toward hyper-localization cross-bred with a healthy dose of psychographic, rather than demographic,-based interest reporting/gathering..
those narrow “families” will be “cross-stitched” into Tribes and, further woven into Clans, large enough, to exert leverage, via demand-pull, on various Economic actors..
is merely one, short, take, your orbit may perturb…
February 17th, 2009 at 2:23 pm
Agreed with my friends who have already commented; particularly re: Zuckerman, and with special kudos for the tribal commentary. Mortimer is incapable of avoiding self promotion even when discussing hard times. He shills for himself with admirable verbosity.
On a personal level re: newspapers, I began reading the Chicago Trib (sports and funnies) when I was ten years old. Forty three years later and still a Chicago resident, I cannot seem to cancel my subscription even though Sam Zell (and market forces) have turned the Trib into a flimsy, shoddy rag. I like a local paper even if it sucks ass, I guess. Besides, taking my laptop into the crapper just feels wrong.
Scott in Chicago