Comments on: Ballmer on papers: Wrong, as usual

By: davidusher

davidusher — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 14:47:19 +0000

i know what you mean, but what i think he's saying is that they will have disappeared enough to be a real niche and not part of the true metrics of the business. vinyl is a niche that is still around but its such a small part of the metrics of the music business overall i think its fair to say its not really significant. or its all but disappeared:)

By: mathewi

mathewi — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 14:02:03 +0000

I totally agree, David — and as I said, I'm not arguing about the
trend itself. But I think it's just hyperbole to say that newspapers
will completely disappear in 10 years, or even 14. As you said, there
are still people who like vinyl, and still people who listen to the
radio, and there will still be people who like to hold paper in their
hands — just not as many as there were before.

By: davidusher

davidusher — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 10:55:16 +0000

hey mathew
i think i fall on his side with this. 14 years is a lifetime these days with tech and information. it took less that that to go from vinyl to cd. less than that to go from cd to digital (we are still in the middle of it). with the right reader (the ireader) married to the environmental concerns and i think its possible. some people with still want paper just like some still want that vinyl:)

By: mathewi

mathewi — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 01:32:06 +0000

Thanks, Jeff — finally someone to help take my side :-)

By: Jeff Crites

Jeff Crites — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 01:04:35 +0000

I agree with you completely. Newspaper (print) will never be a growth industry. But it can serve a core readership (baby boomers alone) for years to come. I think USA Today is a good example of print holding it's own. Grows by a small percentage each year. And the reason - it doesn't try to compete with the internet in terms of timeliness on major news stories. Instead, it serves up interesting & unique articles that are relevant to the day/week ... but are presented magazine style, for those who prefer to NOT fire up the laptop and worry about an electronic connection or WiFi every time you want to read something.

The newspaper industry has a long way to go to improve its web side. I think the main problem there is that most people instinctively seek news online at made-for internet sites (Google News, Techmeme, Drudge, Techcrunch, etc). I rarely think to go to USAToday.com, for example. But I pick up the paper several times a week. Newspapers, like radio, have been reluctant to promote and beef up their online versions - until recently, now they're in a panic - for fear of killing the once golden goose. Well, Craigslist has done that almost by itself.

There are some simple, brick and mortar things that can help translate to more sales. I can't count the number of times I've come across an empty machine when I wanted to pick up a paper to read at lunch somewhere, or at a coffee shop These are key, impulse purchase points. An internet story is always available. But a machine might be empty. Why can't they use simple electronic monitoring to tell the exact times machines are empty each day, and stock them accordingly (or have bigger machines/multple machines at high traffic points ... or a restock van, alerted by the central monitoring office). An improvement of just ten percent in stocking machines properly would mean 200,000 extra sales per day for USA Today (at full price) and higher ad rates to boot.

As for magazines ... Fast Company has seen explosive growth the past two years. Sure, Biz 2.0 fizzled. But that was as much bad management as anything. 650,000 subscribers and couldn't break even? For an 'all things web' effort, their website sucked, for one thing.

I love the web AND I love print. I hope the best of print survives for decades to come.