From Mises Wire:
It was announced this week that the Denver Post will soon be cutting one-third of its newsroom staff. The newsroom currently has 100 reporters, and that will soon be cut by 30 positions.
Reporters and other observers quickly began to look for whom to blame.
. . . .
This latest development comes mere weeks after the Denver Post announced it was erecting a pay wall around the site, no doubt in hopes of capturing more revenue.
At the time, one of the Post’s columnists blamed the readers themselves for the newspaper’s woes, implying that freeloaders were making it too difficult to deliver a media product and still keep the lights on. “We’re so over working for free,” the columnist concluded.
Well, now it appears that a third of the newsroom won’t be working at all since, apparently, the paywall isn’t bringing in as much revenue as hoped.
. . . .
The challenge for newspapers in this regard is no different than with any other market endeavor. In order to stay in business, firms must be able to offer consumers a product at a price that the consumer is willing to pay.
If consumers seem unwilling to pay for access to newspapers, this means the quality is perceived as being too low for the price demanded. The solution lies in either increasing the perceived quality, or reducing the price.
Recent studies have shown that many consumers — especially younger ones — are willing to pay for their news. In fact, the American Press Institute (API) concluded that “nearly 4 in 10 adults under age 35 are paying for news.” But here’s the rub: those who are still considering paying for news are price sensitive. The API’s surveys suggests consumers aren’t interested in paying more than one dollar per week (or 4-5 dollars per month) for their newspapers. Unfortunately for the newspapers, many of them are asking for more than double that rate. The Denver Post demands 12 dollars per month to get past the paywall. That’s even more than The New York Times, which charges eight dollars per month.
. . . .
[T]here is an often-expressed sentiment among reporters, editors, and other newspaper staff that they are under-appreciated and that consumers should just be willing to pay more for access to newspapers. In other words, the belief among newspaper staff is “our quality is already fine, thank you very much. We perform an indispensable public service!” If the public is unwilling to see just how high the quality of newspaper work is, some seem to think, it just must be because the consumers are ignorant, prejudiced, or cheap.
. . . .
Now, it is arguably true that, as newspaper industry people claim, some of the reporting done by newspapers benefits society as a whole. For example, investigative journalism that exposes government corruption has benefits beyond the mere reading enjoyment of subscribers. Even people who aren’t subscribers and never read the publications in question benefit from these activities.
But only a small portion of what newspapers do even qualifies under this “public service” umbrella. Most papers devote the lion’s share of effort to coverage of sports, movies, the local bar scene, and local ribbon cuttings. At the same time, reporters with no actual experience or qualifications in public policy, economics, or business, churn out columns in the opinion pages. None of this counts as a “public service.” Most of it is just entertainment or self-serving filler.
. . . .
[R]elying on the “public service” argument — and attempting to guilt people into paying more for newspapers — isn’t likely to pay the bills. As media scholar Clay Shirky has noted:
The newspaper people often note that newspapers benefit society as a whole. This is true, but irrelevant to the problem at hand; “You’re gonna miss us when we’re gone!” has never been much of a business model.
Link to the rest at Mises Wire
PG sees some parallels with traditional publishing.
It doesn’t help when half of your potential readers think you do not report both political sides of a story. Then those that disagree with your output will not spend their money on your product.
Then the papers site tries to charge for news that is available for no cost at many other sites.
Then there is the no-cost competition, Craigs List, Auto Shopper and various shopping guides.
About the one place where a good newspaper can compete is, local sports and only then if they have good writers.
Although, the readers and writers on local forums do a very good job explaining and interacting with their peers. They do it real time too.
Why should anyone pay for access to the Denver Post’s web site when they can get almost all of the same information for free elsewhere on the web?
A physical newspaper is one thing; you can charge money for that. A subscription to a web site… I’ve never seen
any news site that *wasn’t* a bandwidth-gobbling, psychotic, ad-infected mess. The few people still taking the paper, either they haven’t gotten around to canceling it yet, or they’re not willing to wait through six autoplay movie reloads to read a thirty-line contentless teaser article.
I still subscribe to the daily newspaper, for reasons of domestic tranquility. My wife likes to linger over it. That’s okay. English is her second language, and the newspaper is written at a level she’s comfortable with.
Our town’s newspaper is an amalgam of what used to be separate morning and evening newspapers, but it’s half the thickness of either of them. I look only at the national, local, and business news sections.
The first usually takes no more than two minutes to read, since I already saw that news online a day or two earlier. The local news section includes the editorial page, so it takes a bit longer to read. Usually there’s nothing of interest in the business section, but sometimes there’s a longish article that grabs my interest.
Most days I finish reading the newspaper in five minutes. Taking ten minutes is unusual. These are the most expensive minutes of my day, considering that the annual subscription is around $250 now.
We still get our local major daily, Sunday only. Wife uses it for coupons and I for the funnies, plus maybe one or two other sections. I stopped buying a daily newspaper due to the National Social Justice Warrior Football League. Haven’t really missed it.
Up through the early 80’s, daily/weekly newspapers were fantastic reads and gave you great bang for the buck. Then corporations swooped in, cut the content, raised the prices and turned everything into the newsprint version of the Stepford wives.
I used to do the crossword puzzle everyday at work – simply because there were several newspapers everyday in the lunchroom. Those newspapers aren’t there anymore – and even though I do kind of miss my crossword puzzle – I am NOT going to bother stopping at a news stand to purchase one of my own. The only thing I ever read was the crossword puzzle and the funny pages.
So – are newspapers dying or am I just cheap???
When I travel, I notice the piles of USA Today for free in the hotels. Few take a copy. The problem isn’t price.
I used to pay for a weekend subscription to our local newspaper, and this (was supposed to) also give me access to their digital edition.
However, I received frequent error messages telling me I couldn’t access the content, had to re-register, had used up my monthly allocation of stories, etc. In spending all this time trying to make my online subscription work, I actually read through the terms and conditions which said any disputes between me and the newspaper would be subject to the laws of New York State … except I was a Canadian citizen subscribing to a Canadian publication.
In the end, it wasn’t the money that made me cancel my subscription – it was the complete incompetence in allowing me to access what I’d paid for. This, too, is very like publishing. One of the last trad-pubbed eBooks I purchased started throwing up DRM warnings from the first time I tried to open it on my Kindle.
I truly believe 95 per cent of the population doesn’t want to pirate and if you let us easily access good quality material at a reasonable price, we’ll do so. However, paying for the privilege of jumping through somebody else’s digital ineptitude? Not so much …
denver post is cutting jobs because they have a parent company that not only is making plenty of money on the post but wants more. The investigative reporting esp here in the west where many still play fast and loose with the truth and with unethical endeavors and with money, is vital reportage
We hear Phil Anschutz might pounce on it. Wouldnt be surprised. He owns amongst other things, the mountain world of the Broadmoor, a spacious hotelery cum golf course with near a thousand rooms tucked into the Rockies. When he approached them to buy, they said no. So he bought their parent company instead. I could write a book about him; he is am ultra conservative but has done very very much good with his vast wealth, esp reaching to the poor with the arts and a real education and preps for college that he subsidized
the old denver post may have a comeback. have to wait and see
My subscription lapsed, for the first time in 35 years, on March 18th. I found I was not even often unwrapping the Sunday paper and I infrequently used their online site. Over the years, I found the paper less and less enjoyable to read, with less content of interest. I kept my sub to support local investigative reporting.
I think they really should focus hard on local and pretty much minimize or delete national and international. People can get that from online and tv news. What I really want the paper to offer me is what’s happening of importance or interest in my area, stuff that affects my life. I think I’d happily keep subbing if they offered me a deeper local connection. I don’t give a crap what teams won what games 5 states away. What is impacting me HERE? Local papers should focus on local matters, imo, the good and the bad and the political and the entertaining and the educational…
I suspect when hardcore subscribers like me who used to read the paper religiously, then reduced their sub to online and/or Sunday, begin fade away….newspapers are doomed. (Just as when hardcore bookstore visitors found online is easier and offers more variety and is often cheaper..and stop gong.) They better find out what their subscribers really want.
And really, skip paper and just give me the best local insights on my phone or online. I don’t need more crap to recycle.
I haven’t subscribed to a print newspaper in almost two decades, and I’ve never felt it was worth my while to pay for a digital subscription. Like Ashley said, what’s inside is, for the most part, not worth reading.
I think newspapers got lazy. Or, like Barnes and Noble, decided to cut costs by getting rid of the people who did the work, the reporters. I noticed a long time ago that the “local” newspaper consisted mostly of stories from national services and press releases, not reporting.
Taking a look at the website of the “local” paper this morning, the lead story is from The Associated Press, even though it took place only 90 miles away from me. The next story is from The Tribune Content Agency. The only local stories seem to be the obituaries and local sports.
Couple that with the fact that each page on the site opens with an ad that takes up 2/3 of the screen, followed by the site name and a smaller ad, making me scroll down to see any actual content, and the experience is too annoying to put up with, much less pay for.
When I was younger I used to buy the occasional newspaper; one of the broadsheets, and or the Sunday edition with its supplements. As I’ve gotten older I’m less inclined to do so, because what’s inside isn’t worth reading, and metaphorically nowadays, gets thrown away unread.
Now, while a newspaper can be marketed like buying a cup of coffee, I must also admit to not buying coffee when out, except to socialize. But the social glue that newspapers used to provide has been overtaken by other media.
My guess is that newspapers are dead, they just don’t know it yet. T&CA, E&OE. Free newspapers that rely on advertising will survive.