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For this week’s (well, technically last week’s, but I moved at the end of last week so I’m just now getting to this) assignment for New Media Literacy, we’ve been asked to look at newspapers and the newspaper business. I will be taking a closer look at The Tennessean, newspaper of my new home, Nashville!
Though The Tennessean is read by many across Middle Tennessee, there are certainly less subscribers as more people go online for their news. Of course, there are still die hard newspaper fans, like my husband’s grandmother and great-uncle, who insist upon reading the paper daily. However, for the younger generations, it is much more convenient to go to websites such as Yahoo or CNN to get a quick glance at what is going on in the world. The Tennessean also has an online version of its newspaper, as do many other newspapers across the globe.
I asked two people for their opinions on the current problems facing newspapers today—here are their responses:
“The current problem is how to boost readership in an all internet world! I still enjoy reading the paper, but people of your generation and younger I think forego it in favor of electronic media, be it computer, blackberry, etc”
“By the time you get the paper, the news is already old because it isn't updated in real time. People know this, so people in our generation don't buy them. Real reporting is also a dying art as a result--why try to compete with instantly updating internet sites when your "scoop" will be hours, if not days, old?”
Obviously this is an extremely miniscule sample of the population, but I think they are right on the money.
In my opinion, the biggest problem with newspapers is that because of media such as television and the Internet, once something happens, it is almost instantly on television and/or websites. This can’t happen with newspapers, as they only come out once a day, or sometimes even less often.
There are certainly those that like newspapers though. A lot of people just like the feel of the paper in their hands (not me, I can’t stand the feel of newspaper!) or like seeing the various things such as advertisements, sale papers and coupons. There are parts of the paper that are easier to view online though, such as the classifieds section.
Another thing about newspapers is that they can be more geared for a particular population. For example, the local paper of where I lived previously had a lot of information about politics, sports and religion. Since I don’t care anything about any of those items, I never looked at the paper. However, a lot of the community wanted this information, so that is what was put in the paper.
When I asked my sources if they had any good ideas about improving the news in their areas, I received the following responses:
“Well if it was financially feasible (which it isn’t) I think a local community paper would be excellent just to let you know what was going on in your area”
"’Good’ ideas? There aren't any. Newspapers in the age of blackberries and the internet are doomed to become cage liner for my iguana. The best they can do is try to get online and update important news in real time. More editions would give them more of an opportunity to put it in print, but in this green age, that would be an even bigger death sentence for the newspaper.”
Overall, while I think that newspaper reading has certainly declined as access to instant news is more readily available, I don’t think they will fold. There are too many people that still enjoy reading the newspaper. Of course, this is primarily the older generations, so as they pass away, newspapers just might become a piece of the past. As the saying goes, only time will tell!
