Everyone has their hand out these days, including newspapers. Of course the proponent behind this is a democrat.
Frank Nicastro – (D), who represents Connecticut’s 79th assembly district, is asking the state government to do something to salvage The Bristol Press, a paper that may fold within days, along with The Herald. The papers’ publisher, Journal Register, is in danger of being crushed under millions of dollars in debt, and can’t afford to keep them open.
Then let them close. Let them die a miserable death. The local newspapers are not even worth buying anymore. The News Sentinel is a shadow of its former self, and the Journal Gazette is heading in the same direction. If the Journal Register is being crushed from millions of dollars worth of debt, a handout will only delay the inevitable
“The media is a vitally important part of America,” Nicastro said, particularly local papers that cover news ignored by big papers and television and radio stations.
Is that right? Why then does the local “old” media constantly check the blogs for stories, sometimes even claiming they have an exclusive when in fact a local blogger did? They (Journal Gazette/News Sentinel) won’t even give attribution to local blogs when they cite them.
But, relying on the government has raised ethical questions for the press, whose role has been to operate without government influence and media experts predict that 2009 will be the year that newspapers will “die” in wake of the financial meltdown.
This has nothing to do with the “financial meltdown”. Newspapers are old hat, and they know it. Dwindling readership, falling subscriptions and advertisers moving towards new media are all part of the problem.
Former Miami Herald Editor Tom Fiedler says that a democracy has an obligation to preserve a free press. More here.
That is unless you’re a conservative talk show. Then the democrats want to silence you.
AWB
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Tags: Bailout, Journal Gazette, Journal Register, News Sentinel
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In America, we know that TV networks and newspapers owned by foreign governments can be less than reliable and anything they say must be taken with a grain of salt. State-sponsored media should be taken with the same grain of salt as state-owned media.
Possible headline idea for the Herald a year from now: OUR GLORIOUS GOVERNOR REVEALS HIS PLAN TO HELP THE STRUGGLING PROLETARIAT!
Back to my days of radio, we were able to compete with and take newspaper advertising dollars the easiest of any other media. We were able to show potential clients that they truly were wasting a lot of their advertising dollars with newspapers. My favorite trick was to reduce a copy of their ad by 50% and ask them if that was indeed their ad in the paper and they would always readily agree that it was and were dumbfounded when I could quickly show them how that copy being reduced could shave a minimum of 30% off of their advertising budget. Amazing.
Then I would follow up with the fact it was the older generation who were very stuck in their ways who were still indeed subscribing to the newspaper, the younger people being much more busy and barely having time to sit and read a paper, were gleaning most of their news from the internet and tv…
How often do you, as a non-subscriber to the Journal Gazette or News Sentinel get calls offering free newspaper delivery for a week, two weeks or even a month in a desperate attempt to hook you in to subscribing? I think I have finally gotten off that call list, personally, but I used to get them quite frequently. And then guess what? All the free papers they were delivering, they were counting as actual subscribers and jacking up the number of subscribers in hopes to lure in the advertising dollars.
The local newspapers have been experiencing a slow and painful death for the last several years. I do feel bad for them, but the times, they are a changing. Our local newspaper has gone electronic and charges the same per month to subscribe to the full fledged electronic edition as to have the old paper copy delivered to your home. They feature daily teasers you can see for free, but for the whole ball of wax, you pay. Perhaps a good idea.
I’m sure Mr. Nicastro can count on Mark Souder’s vote right after he votes yes for the RV bailout.