Is there a thread for the rapid death of the newspaper industry?

those folding instructions are wtf. assume that bit's a joke?

burkesworks says:
4 August 2009 at 3:08 pm

Good old Graun; even in a parallel universe, its headlines contain spelling mistakes. There is no "c" in "dietitian".

Apparently the newspaper of the future looked a bit like a student magazine.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8186701.stm

Murdoch signals end of free news

News Corp is set to start charging online customers for news content across all its websites.

It'll be interesting to see how this pans out.

May 2010: Murdoch calls for the shut-down of BBC News website, claiming 'anti-competitive'...

From the copy of Press Gazette in front of me, it's estimated that the revenue for a Times Online behind a subscription wall would come in at £3.6m a year. That's fuck all.

More importantly, why would anyone pay for an online subscription when they could just buy the paper? PAYG use for the website might be the way forward here but I still don't see it.

Aye but think of the income from The Sun. I mean who wouldn't pay for quality coverage like this

http://i29.tinypic.com/29dwkgl.jpg

Where will we go for our shonky Arshavin photoshops now?

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/17/business/media/17ft.html?_r=2&ref=media

sounds like a good idea to me.

Great idea for business papers, yeah. But financial firms are a) rich and b) used to paying through the nose for useful information. Don't think that works as well with people happy with the Metro.

Did the crash mean we missed out on pouring one out for thelondonpaper? Not that I didn't get a good enough dose of that from 80% of my Facebook list but wh'ever.

Dulce et decorum est pro [NEWS INTERNATIONAL] mori

NewsInt irony LOL: report the Obs is to close, then be the company to shut down a paper. I have a friend there and it sucks he'll have to redouble his work effort. It also sucks (although proportionally much less) that I won't ride shotgun to do restaurant reviews any more, best plus-one scenario there is outside of free air travel.

I'm reliably informed that the Murdoch machine pursued that fake scoop in revenge for the NOTW wiretap scandal exposé.

people on twitter seriously concerned for the future of "em". no word yet from creator maria smedstad. will no one think of the twee middle class professionals living in shared houses?

xp "fake scoop" is pushing it a bit considering it was... factually accurate in all respects and leaked by observer execs?

is the observer about to close or not? do we know for certain if it was totally made up by news int?

Private Eye seemed to think they were being cagy about discussing it but definitely considering it, as far as I remember.

^I think PE is usually right about these things as they only take sides against the stupid, but with the caveat that there was one of those meetings where all options were trial-ballooned. The immense brand value of being the world's oldest Sunday paper will probably save the Obs from GMG hassle, not an advantage of other loss-making titles.

independent deathwatch: closed by xmas says (somewhat shit-stirring) second largest shareholder. losing £70,000 a day, apparently.

"There's no point in us as a company subsidising a newspaper that really nobody wants to read in the United Kingdom," said Denis O'Brien.

http://www.reuters.com/article/rbssTechMediaTelecomNews/idUSLI32052720090918?sp=true

I'm amazed it's lasted as long as it has.

The Independent and presumably the IoS folding would presumably ensure the future of the Observer, what with GMG having the whole centre-left market to itself.

This Denis O'Brien character seems like a bit of a dick, tbh.

Michael Moore on why it's happening here, and not in Europe (true?):

http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2009/09/michael_moore_o.php

not really a comparable situation because we have a basically "national" print media. local press is – mostly – dead here already.

and we are likely going to lose a national paper here, one of the four "qualities", quite soon.

Is it so hard to say "Independent"?

Haha considering how they can't make the Independent mean anything to people *here* how does Morbs knowing the name of the paper make any difference?

exactly

Is there any non-tabloid that still turns a profit? The Telegraph maybe? At this stage of the game, "quality" newspapers are just vanity publishing for billionaires.

"at this stage of the game"?

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_bkFIPLIOGL8/SFcYYLIYqZI/AAAAAAAAOjU/V7hJi_29Rx0/s400/citizen+kane.jpg

xpost Point taken, but surely there was a time when there was at least a chance of making some cash? The Sunday Times used to be a cash cow for Murdoch, didn't it?

yeah. i reckon the sunday times still does make a profit (?)

xpost think the s-times was making a profit as recently as last year, suspect it will be back in the black as the economy picks up. telegraph made money in 08 as well.

re: local press, it's not dead and is often profitable. the mirror has been propped up by its regional business for years now. dunno why classified ads haven't moved online the way they did in the usa.

Most local newspaper publishers have been pretty appalling when it comes to creating websites that anyone would actually look at, might be the reason?

Our local paper seems to be thriving, unfortunately. It's hit on the winning formula of "The Past - wasn't it lovely! Modern life is rubbish"

(the fact that most people say "local paper" singular suggests how things have gone down. though it is surprising they even exist tbh.)

Most local newspaper publishers have been pretty appalling when it comes to creating websites that anyone would actually look at, might be the reason?

― Matt DC, Tuesday, 22 September 2009 10:44 (6 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i meant things like craigslist or i guess gumtree here. clearly people use them, but they haven't taken away the ad business of local papers in the way that they seem to have done in the states.

Ah right - I thought you meant US publishers seeing an upturn in their own online classified sales.

so, i picked the wrong day to rep for the financial viability of local newspapers. trinity mirror just closed three of them. :(

http://www.holdthefrontpage.co.uk/news/090922tmnorthwales.shtml

The Whitchurch Herald, meanwhile, has a paid-for circulation of 3,883 in a town with a population of just 8,944.

This is one of the papers being closed, presumably selling to 43% of the available marketplace would indicate that it plays/played a pretty major role in the local community? That's really sad.

The Ad Director of the Standard has just left to become Commercial Director of the Indy, which is a weird move all things considered.

Big fan of local media in theory, because noone else is keeping an eye on what local govt gets up to - but every time I see a story I know something about, it's teeth-clenchingly wrong

wasn't sure where to put this, so i'm putting it here. 1981 report on first attempts at getting the news online. feel a bit like sarah connor when she meets the guy who invented skynet.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5WCTn4FljUQ

Evening Standard goes free from Monday: http://www.brandrepublic.com/News/942719/

http://www.brandrepublic.com/News/942719/London-Evening-Standard-become-free-circulation-paper/

The Standard's Russian owner Alexander Lebedev said his intention to make the paper available to a wider audience was for it to function as a "deterrent against corruption".

lol

It's been pretty much free for a while now anyway. Anytime I've been heading home later than about 8 in the past I've seen the same guys that give out other freesheets, only wearing yellow t-shirts instead of purple.

It was only free after 8pm because no fucker bought it after then. And it probably works out cheaper to pay guys to hand them out rather than pulp or landfill the leftover copies.

And some quick sums show that all those 50p sales add up to £32mn a year - does doubling its income from advertising cover that? I'd guess so.

The most important subset of numbers are 155 and 5. They refer to £155, the worth of an average reader to a paid-for newspaper a year in 2008. It breaks down to £90 a year from purchase price and £65 from advertising. Annual revenue from newspaper online totals just £5.

Standard going freesheet is unbelievably stupid of them right now, surely? Although presumably this will kill the London Lite with a stroke though?