Warren Buffett "would not buy (newspapers) at any price"

[2muchcoffeeman]

Well, nobody ever accused him of being an idiot.<blockquote>Warren Buffett has long held himself out as a newspaper man. As a child, one of his first jobs was delivering newspapers. An Omaha newspaper Berkshire owned, Sun Newspapers, won a Pulitzer Prize in 1973 based in part on a tip Mr. Buffett provided. One of Berkshire’s biggest investments in the 1970s was the Buffalo News, which it still owns.

But his view on the future of the newspaper industry is dismal. “For most newspapers in the United states, we would not buy them at any price,” he said in response to a question about whether he would consider investing in newspapers. “They have the possibility of going to just unending losses.”

The problem, he said, is that newspapers were once essential to the American public. As long as newspapers were essential to readers, they were essential to advertisers, But news is available in many other venues, such as the Internet, which means a dramatic drop in advertising revenue.</blockquote>http://blogs.wSportsJournalists.com/marketbeat/2009/05/02/buffett-sees-unending-losses-for-many-newspapers/

 

[JayFarrar]

saw that and my soul froze.
buffett is a big newspaper guy, reads five papers a day, and owns them as well.
if he's turned, that's big trouble and since so many people do whatever buffett does, the end is nigh.

 

[Double Down]

People will just get their news elsewhere! You known, from all those ****ing blogs and sites like "the google" who make rounds and rounds of cop calls and attend city council meetings to make sure no one is dumping lead paint into your well water.

So tired of people saying "people are just getting their news elsewhere." Yes, they're getting it elsewhere from people who are grabbing original reporting and giving it their "take" and then posting it between pictures of Kate Perry's tits.

Hey readers! Glad you continue to thumb your nose at the mainstream media and visit my site! Here's my take on this NYT story about what's going on in Tikrit. I bet it was reported from a balcony in Amman. Anyway, I can't read the Times anymore because it has so much bias, so if I want to read about what's going on in Iraq, I'll just Google it.

 

[Frank_Ridgeway]

He was sucking 35 percent profit margins out of the Buffalo News in good times, so **** him. He was part of the problem, bleeding the golden goose dry without any real investments in building for the future.

 

[shotglass]

I really couldn't give less of a rat's ass about what Warren ****ing Buffett has to say about the future of newspapers.

 

[lone star scribe]

I really couldn't give less of a rat's ass about what Warren ****ing Buffett has to say about the future of newspapers.

I understand the sentiment, but you should care, if only because so many other people will let him do their thinking for them.

 

[shotglass]

I should do a lot of things. I'm still standing.

 

[Dave Kindred]

Buffett, in his Berkshire Hathaway annual report of 1992, said much the same thing. The only good news is, he hasn't yet bailed. Owns the Buffalo News, is deep into The Washington Post company (on the board, owns 18 percent of the stock).

 

[Kid Presentable]

“For most newspapers in the United states, we would not buy them at any price,” he said in response to a question about whether he would consider investing in newspapers. “They have the possibility of going to just unending losses.”

That seems like more of an indictment against the management instead of the newspapers themselves. He's right -- many papers right now are ****ed. But is he selling the Buffalo News?

 

[Stitch]

People will just get their news elsewhere! You known, from all those ****ing blogs and sites like "the google" who make rounds and rounds of cop calls and attend city council meetings to make sure no one is dumping lead paint into your well water.

So tired of people saying "people are just getting their news elsewhere." Yes, they're getting it elsewhere from people who are grabbing original reporting and giving it their "take" and then posting it between pictures of Kate Perry's tits.

Hey readers! Glad you continue to thumb your nose at the mainstream media and visit my site! Here's my take on this NYT story about what's going on in Tikrit. I bet it was reported from a balcony in Amman. Anyway, I can't read the Times anymore because it has so much bias, so if I want to read about what's going on in Iraq, I'll just Google it.

Any links to Kate Perry's tits? The statement is useless without photos.

 

[Football_Bat]

“For most newspapers in the United states, we would not buy them at any price,” he said in response to a question about whether he would consider investing in newspapers. “They have the possibility of going to just unending losses.”

That seems like more of an indictment against the management instead of the newspapers themselves. He's right -- many papers right now are ****ed. But is he selling the Buffalo News?

He can write the losses off. The Buffalo News is a mere pimple on the Berkshire empire.

 

[JackReacher]

I really couldn't give less of a rat's ass about what Warren ****ing Buffett has to say about the future of newspapers.

I know what you're saying, but what he says and thinks can have a substantial impact on others and could dicate their way of thinking. And that could cost a lot of good newspaper folks their jobs. (I know, I know....as if they're not losing their jobs already.)

I don't know what to think. And I'm not really sure it matters what anyone thinks at this point. Sad.

 

[Mediator]

"People will just get their news elsewhere! You known, from all those ****ing blogs and sites like "the google" who make rounds and rounds of cop calls and attend city council meetings to make sure no one is dumping lead paint into your well water.

So tired of people saying "people are just getting their news elsewhere." Yes, they're getting it elsewhere from people who are grabbing original reporting and giving it their "take" and then posting it between pictures of Kate Perry's tits.

Hey readers! Glad you continue to thumb your nose at the mainstream media and visit my site! Here's my take on this NYT story about what's going on in Tikrit. I bet it was reported from a balcony in Amman. Anyway, I can't read the Times anymore because it has so much bias, so if I want to read about what's going on in Iraq, I'll just Google it."

Double Down, that post gets my vote for best of the year. Just beautifully done.

 

[sirvaliantbrown]

People will just get their news elsewhere! You known, from all those ****ing blogs and sites like "the google" who make rounds and rounds of cop calls and attend city council meetings to make sure no one is dumping lead paint into your well water.

So tired of people saying "people are just getting their news elsewhere." Yes, they're getting it elsewhere from people who are grabbing original reporting and giving it their "take" and then posting it between pictures of Kate Perry's tits.

Hey readers! Glad you continue to thumb your nose at the mainstream media and visit my site! Here's my take on this NYT story about what's going on in Tikrit. I bet it was reported from a balcony in Amman. Anyway, I can't read the Times anymore because it has so much bias, so if I want to read about what's going on in Iraq, I'll just Google it.

Is this really what you think of blogs?

Your fundamental point - that bloggers rely on the original reporting they're getting free - is a good one. But this is a pretty bad caricature of the political/foreign affairs blogosphere.

 

[KP]

People will just get their news elsewhere! You known, from all those ****ing blogs and sites like "the google" who make rounds and rounds of cop calls and attend city council meetings to make sure no one is dumping lead paint into your well water.

So tired of people saying "people are just getting their news elsewhere." Yes, they're getting it elsewhere from people who are grabbing original reporting and giving it their "take" and then posting it between pictures of Kate Perry's tits.

Hey readers! Glad you continue to thumb your nose at the mainstream media and visit my site! Here's my take on this NYT story about what's going on in Tikrit. I bet it was reported from a balcony in Amman. Anyway, I can't read the Times anymore because it has so much bias, so if I want to read about what's going on in Iraq, I'll just Google it.

A-****ing-men

 

[sirvaliantbrown]

DD, I don't mean to criticize you in particular. But I'm frequently frustrated by the antiblogism - soon you'll be saying they should have their own SCHOOLS! - on the board. What happens here, and what I thought your message exemplified, is the equivalent of people saying they're mocking "newspapers" when they're really mocking the New York Post or something. In other words: You're not talking about "blogs," there...you're talking about the worst of blogs.

I have 15 blogs in the Middle East/Foreign Affairs section of my RSS reader. (Yes yes, congratulations to me.) Each one of them is written by an expert of some sort - a long-time journalist, an Iranian professor, a dissident, a U.S. military scholar, a scholarly ex-Marine, and so on and so on. Not one of the 15 comes even close to conforming to the cartoonish descriptions of blogs that appear to predominate here. Nor do the liberal blogs I read, nor do the conservative blogs I read, nor the feminist blogs, environmentalist blogs, economics blogs...

Honestly, listening to SportsJournalists.com-ers talk about blogs is like listening to many Republican politicians these days talk about America. I just want to shake both groups of you and say, "It's not...like that!"

There are problems with blogs. Blogs can never replace newspapers. Blogs rely on original newspaper reporting. Yes yes yes. But we can't have a good discussion on them unless we talk about them fairly.

 

[shotglass]

In the previous generation, those voices you refer to would have found their place in newspapers. However, it is easier now to be a lone wolf and do it without journalistic safeguards.

Yes, safeguards -- of fairness, of libel.

And the fact that people will give all those voices as much credence as today's professional print journalist is another major reason newspapers are sinking slowly into the sunset. So, no, I won't give blogs too much positive credit.