LA Times Just Realized That Print And Online Newsrooms Should Be The Same?
from the a-bit-slow-on-the-uptake,-huh? dept
Nearly three years ago, we were surprised to hear the NY Times proudly announce that it was going to merge its online and offline newsrooms. What we couldn't believe was that in 2005 a newspaper actually still had thought it made sense to treat the two separately. However, apparently the Times was way ahead of some other newspapers. Buried in the ho-hum news about massive LA Times layoffs is the news that, as part of this reorganization, it's finally going to merge its web and print operations as well. When you're sitting around wondering where newspapers went wrong, the fact that they wanted to keep web and print operations separate is probably a good place to start.
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Filed Under: layoffs, newspapers, print, web
Companies: la times, tribune company
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It's just a passing fad, you know
Why would anyone read on a small screen instead of a broadsheet and have the comfort of ink on their fingers?
And just how do you use the internet to wash your windows? :-)
ttfn
John
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Re: It's just a passing fad, you know
Simple, look up window washer's, make sure you have a credit card =p
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Re: It's just a passing fad, you know
We leave an age of wisdom and enter a world of "information" where one man's information is as good as another. All of the facile tricks leave us to believe we are at ease in Zion.
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Re: Re: It's just a passing fad, you know
I'm old enough to have lived much of my adult life without the internet. With is way better. Really. The internet doesn't disable people, it opens worlds. I find books I would never have heard of otherwise, and I can buy them online easily. I have diagnosed health problems that doctor's missed, and have caught problems with prescribed medicines. When I wanted to homeschool, I read the education laws myself and didn't need to rely on the local public school authorities who were either ignorant or antagonistic and routinely misinformed people about their rights. I have connected with people all over the world whom I would never otherwise have met.
I trust my own experience with the internet more than speculation and theory, and my experience tells me I have been strengthened, not weakened, by "technopolization."
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Immediately, the focus of front page, left-hand column news stories switched from in-depth local interest to - Midwest, East Coast and after a time, irrelevant international stories. They meant nothing to me. I don't want to read about the struggle for economic survival in Detroit, on an in-depth first-person level. Those stories should have remained with a Los Angeles focus. As a former Times subscriber, I speak from personal experience.
After a while, the web changed my news reading habits. I now have a Google home page customized for my interests - Time Mag, Newsweek, CBC, BBC and CNN, Techdirt, as well as some local Canadian newspaper websites. I have no reason to ever subscribe to a paper newspaper, ever again in my life.
There was another simpler change that caused me to stop buying the Times at the newsstand, after I had cancelled my subscription. The news rack price doubled to 50 cents. When the price was still a quarter, I had the habit of grabbing a Times and reading it while I ate a meal in a restaurant. At 50 cents, which I certainly could still afford, it just wasn't worth digging in my pocket for the extra quarter to buy a newspaper. Instead, I'd read the one left behind by other diners.
Now I scope out the news headlines on my wi-fi Smart Phone while I'm eating in a restaurant. My hands never get dirty with newsprint. Ultimately, these are not battles that the Times is positioned to win. They have lost the hearts and loyalty of former subscribers and paying customers.
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Re: Re:
My point about the woes of Detroit was simple - those intensive, and important stories, are fine for national news magazines, but after the LA Times became a Chicago tribune property, the paper completely abandoned their rich and award-winning history of in-depth local stories, about our our own local residents and communities.
That was why I quit subscribing to the LA Times. I didn't mean to imply that the suffering of Detroit residents wasn't important, just that the primary news focus of a local newspaper should be the community it serves.
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