March 29, 2008...12:29 pm
Traditional media in a downturn or downward spiral?
Jeff Jarvis: “[N]ewspapers will not — not — recover what they have lost. They lose doubly in a downturn: advertisers spend less because they have less and then they realize they can keep spending less. It’s a reverse plateau.”
The article that Jeff references is interesting. The newspaper industry still claims that there is a rising tide as newspapers develop stronger web properties. That would be nice if it were true, but the problem that most of them face is that they don’t have the original news, editorial content and other elements of value that will sustain them online. As newspapers go out of business, of course the New York Times and Wall Street Journal are safe (at least for now). Their original content has value and their online properties are strong. They’ll continue to live on in some form. And maybe the smalltown newspaper like the one I grew up with will somehow find a way as local interests drive the aggregation of their content under larger umbrellas. Maybe. But most newspapers are dead in the water.
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