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Wash. Post columnist: Time to shut down the small papers

Discussion in 'Journalism topics only' started by JayFarrar, Dec 10, 2008.

  1. JayFarrar

    JayFarrar Well-Known Member

    From a web chat at washingtonpost.com
    Yes, let's kill off all the small papers that provide the financial backbone for most media companies to prop up the money losing metros. And, while we are at it, let's shut down all the papers that aren't named the Washington Post or NY Times. Plus, curses to the family-owned papers who stand in the way of the corporate media companies. It is all the small papers fault.
    I don't know to laugh or get really angry.
     
  2. forever_town

    forever_town Well-Known Member

    He's full of shit.

    That is all.
     
  3. TheSportsPredictor

    TheSportsPredictor Well-Known Member

    Small town papers should die so the readers can read his out-of-touch garbage in the Washington Post?
     
  4. PeteyPirate

    PeteyPirate Guest

    You may disagree, but this is the guy who just won the Pulitzer for predicting the current economic crisis before the fact. He might very well be wrong about this, but his record is being right.
     
  5. txsportsscribe

    txsportsscribe Active Member

    i don't care what he's done before, he's dead wrong on this. it's not the small papers killing the business. what a prick.
     
  6. expendable

    expendable Well-Known Member

    It's not hard to predict that an over-inflated balloon will one day pop.
     
  7. Starman

    Starman Well-Known Member

    Awww yeah, that'll go over real well.

    ::) ::) ::)


    And every 7-Eleven (not even to say mom-and-pop grocery store) in towns under 25,000 should close down so everyone can drive 75 miles to the Megamongopolis Wal-Mart once every two weeks to stock up on food.
     
  8. Mizzougrad96

    Mizzougrad96 Active Member

    The papers that are the most healthy, or have seen the lowest drop in circulation, are the smaller papers.

    While I disagree with this guy, I could see a day where the only papers are the big papers. They absorb all of the smaller papers in their region and then the readers have no choice. Gannett is already looking at doing something similar, as we have talked about on countless previous threads. Every city gets USA Today wrapped in a few pages of local news.
     
  9. Drip

    Drip Active Member

    Most Americans DO NOT live in metropolis areas. Obviously, he has not done his homework.
     
  10. Joe Williams

    Joe Williams Well-Known Member

    Had same reaction as most of those above. He is serving a large, semi-national newspaper, and calling for the end of the small fry. Gee, not at all self-serving.

    I thought the small fry were, on the whole, hanging in relatively well, at least where they weren't part of skinflints' chains. If so, then MYOB, Pearlstein.
     
  11. PeteyPirate

    PeteyPirate Guest

    Either him, or you.

    http://www.brookings.edu/articles/2008/1008_smalltowns_katz.aspx

     
  12. txsportsscribe

    txsportsscribe Active Member

    and those people are often better-served by the podunk times as far as localized news. for instance, the dallas morning news supposedly serves a buttload of suburbs and adjacent counties but they do a lousy job of covering those suburbs and counties on a regular basis. and i'd bet it's the same way at other metro gorillas.
     
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