A Print Journalist Who Understands the Changing Media

I still take the dead tree version of the Orange County Register, though I have to admit it's mostly for the comics and the local news. Most of the national or political stuff I've been reading online for 24 hours before I see it in the paper. Such is the media situation these days.

This morning I read a good column by Senior Editorial Writer Steven Greenhut on the changing media market and what newspapers should do to respond to it. Greenhut gets it, and his compatriots in the newspaper business would be well-advised to pay attention:

Newspaper navel-gazers are having a field day writing about the death of the news industry, as newspaper circulation numbers are stable or falling, and as Internet Web sites, blogs (Web logs, or news diaries produced online), talk radio and cable TV are becoming the main news sources for many people.

No doubt, we are witnessing a Wild West world of journalism, a far cry from the days when Americans read the same newspapers and chose between one of three liberal talking heads on the 6:30 news.

You have an opinion these days? No need to depend solely on the gatekeeper on the op-ed page to give you access. You have a breaking news story to report? No need to cajole a reporter or news director to go after it. You can opine yourself. You can cover the story yourself and post it immediately.

This is the equivalent of the Protestant Reformation for the media, where every man can become his own pope, or in this case his own publisher. There is virtually no cost of entry into the Internet news world, although it's not easy to garner enough readers to have an influence on the debate.

This is a wonderful development for everyone who likes to read or who has something to say, and it is not necessarily a threat to newspapers, which can thrive in this competitive new world. Unfortunately, many members of the mainstream media (MSM, in blogger-ese), feel threatened by the competition. Instead of taking lessons from the competition (i.e., be lively and opinionated, eschew political correctness, feature tough investigative journalism, focus on diversity of thought rather than diversity of ethnicity, focus on local news), they are spending their time carping at the new media or making fun of their customers ("people don't read any more.")

He's right about the difficulty of attracting readership, but readership will build over time...as long as the blogger is not a complete wingnut and has something fresh and interesting to say. The challenge is getting your stuff read often enough that people will want to keep returning to see what's new.

What Greenhut points out is that the media is experiencing competition unlike anything it has seen for many years, and competition tends to improve everybody's product.

So, readers get a lot more than they used to get. They get a competitive atmosphere with constant news breaking. The newspapers still provide most of the leg work and the necessary in-depth coverage of events. Opinion pages still provide in-depth insights, but the blogs offer running news and commentary with an entertaining informality. Stories are reported, updated and corrected as the day goes on.

We're experiencing new glory days for the news business, similar to the old days when competing newspapers were hawked on street corners, except that much of what publishers are hawking must now be read on a computer screen.

Similar competition is infusing the broadcast industry, with the growth of satellite TV and even satellite radio. Soon enough the sky will be the limit in terms of channel choices, with an exponential growth in news competition on the airwaves.

There's room for everything: a booming newspaper business providing the in-depth and local reporting, a lively blogosphere, network TV news, cable and satellite programs, talk radio and magazines. It's not the medium but what's in the medium.

The key is content. Whoever offers stories the public wants to read or watch will flourish. Whoever doesn't will fade away. Competition always forces the old guard to change, but in the end it is good for everyone. The only thing that isn't good is the whining and carping from those who refuse to change.

Just stop and think for a moment about all the places where there isn't competition. For instance, the DMV. Anyone who has stood in endless lines in order to talk with bored, uncaring DMV workers or other government drones knows it's the lack of competition that allows these people to keep their jobs and continue abusing the public.

Although the DMV has no direct competition, I can do many of my DMV-related activities at the Auto Club, an organization which must provide good service or risk losing my business. My experiences with them have always been superior to any dealings with the bureaucrats. The Auto Club employees care about their customers because they have to in order to stay in business. A little competition is a good thing.

Once the MSM figures out that the blogosphere isn't going away, perhaps they'll accept the competitive challenge and follow Mr. Greenhut's advice and make their product better. Otherwise, I don't see an end to the slow but continual slide in readership that the dead tree media is experiencing.