Wednesday, March 11, 2009

Time Magazine: "The 10 Most Endangered Newspapers in America"

Time Magazine lists what it calls the "Top 10 Most Endangered Newspapers in America." For readers of this blog, the newspapers that made the list are not surprising.

The list includes a lot of two-market newspapers -- Boston Globe, Philly Daily News, Detroit News, San Francisco Chronicle -- with two single market papers, which is a problem. The Miami Herald and Cleveland Plain Dealer, both of which are well regarded for producing meaningful journalism.

The article predicts the Miami Herald will shift to online-only, with English and Spanish websites. The Plain Dealer may shut or go online-only, probably the former. That would leave Cleveland with no daily paper, which I think is a real problem.

Meanwhile, Time Magazine has an interesting article, "The Race for a Better Read." Veteran tech journalist Josh Quittner suggests that the salvation could be through electronic devices such as a Kindle to be able to charge for content. I think it's an interesting but flawed idea because I think 1) content will still be available on the Internet; and 2) the iTunes analogy is flawed because people like to listen to music again and again whereas news articles are more disposable.

Still, I'm interested in any idea that goes beyond the same-old since that hasn't helped print newspapers.

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