A Columnist's Modest Proposal To Save The Newspaper Industry
from the make-'em-pay dept
As newspapers struggle to adapt to the internet, they're received plenty of bad advice on what they should do. But it all pales in comparison to the suggestions from the San Francisco Chronicle's David Lazarus, who uses his latest column to offer his prescription for what's ailing his industry. In his view, the answer is to start charging for all web content. The consumers are getting a free lunch, in his view, because they get to read the paper online for free. Of course, he recognizes that there are some problems with his plan. He knows that if one newspaper were to start charging, then readers would just go over to another paper that didn't charge, or as he puts it, the free newspapers would enjoy "an influx of penny-pinching readers at the expense of rival publications." So, he insists that this move must be made by every newspaper in the country simultaneously. Barring that, he thinks papers should at least adopt the TimesSelect model, even though it has basically been a flop. This is obviously an impossible dream and even if it happened, there would still be plenty of places to read the news for free online. Because he knows how unlikely this is, Lazarus has a backup plan. He wants the industry to follow Viacom's lead, and start going after companies that "profit" from newspaper content without paying up. So, for example, sites like the Drudge Report that mainly just link to newspapers should be forced to pay for that right. Of course, this view is reminiscent of the attacks on Google News, which are not only shortsighted but have no basis in the law. Still, we can at least respect his wishes, and as a favor to him, we won't link to his column, since that could be construed as profiting from his work. If you're interested, you can find it yourself, but don't use Google News, because that would defeat the point.
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Collusion?
Is he trying to start the OPEC of the news world?
Derek.
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he has a point but it will never happen
Most of the left over news on the internet is feeds from AP and blogs.
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he has a point but it will never happen
Most of the left over news on the internet is feeds from AP and blogs.
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Wait Wait
And isn't content what drives circulation.
maybe the problem isn't with competition and free access to news maybe its with the "Content" that lacks and thats why sales are down.
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The really funny thing is that newspapers have never made money by what they charge for delivery. Having been in the business for more than 20 years, I know that subscription revenue pays less than one-third the cost to print and distribute a newspaper. The internet offers the opportunity to drastically reduce the production and distribution cost for newspapers.
What has paid the freight in the past is advertising. In order for advertising to work, there must be eyeballs. Limiting access will limit eyeballs. Therefore, limiting access is not a recipe for success.
The real issue facing newspapers is that after hundreds of years with audiences that had little choice (you got your town's paper because that was the only one available), newspapers find themselves existing in a world glutted with choices. The way to move forward toward a profitable future is not to fight people's ability to choose. I would suggest that newspapers need to focus more on providing the unique and compelling content that will make readers choose them -- in print or online.
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Re:
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Content
Give me someone thats interesting, thats worth reading. I miss the old newspaper of my youth, well at least PBS still has the Newshour With Jim Lehrer.
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Re: Content
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Interesting but....
What the newspapers need to understand, is that the audience is still out there and viable, and it's the product that changing - not the content. With the advent of the web the physical newspaper - and the associated production co$t$ - became outdated. If the content that you produce is still "award winning" it will drive readership, and if you can track your readership - you can target ads - oh and by the way - give your advertisers better statistical data - which they will pay for. --- Just a thought
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how to fight the competition from the net
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Perhaps they should ask the Metro paper for leads?
The huge difference is that every day they distribute over 1,000,000 paper copies to their readership FREE
Yup - bugger me backwards with a stick if I lie - FREE
So here's a company that don't have to worry about the online readership stealing their paying readers, THEY DON'T HAVE ANY!
Kind of proves the point re how papers make their money and turns the argument around slightly, are the papers pissed because they lose money via the internet or because they were hoping to make MORE money and the opportunity just hasn't materialised?
As for the copying of stories I see plenty of broadsheet columnists who use phrases such as "Tom Thingumy in the times writes....", "according to columnists at the journal...." etc etc. Why should blogging or online journalism be treated any differently? Sure it's annoying if someone rips your entire article completely without giving credit and yeah under those circumstances sue away, but for just referring to your article?
The simple solution is not to censor but to increase the quality of your articles, make people want to come to your site, incentivise your site with special offers etc etc, don't hide it!
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The Drudge
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Old media is dead
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