TheDesk.net’s Post

As demand dwindles for mass print publications, we face new opportunities. What are your thoughts on print versus digital, mainstream versus indie and old-skool journalism versus the rise of the creator economy? Is it the end — or the beginning? https://lnkd.in/dZmyxus3 #PrintMedia #MediaStrategy #MarieTalksMedia

Hell, yes, 🅿🆁🅸🅽🆃! Here's the graph that caught my eye: "𝙅𝙖𝙘𝙤𝙗𝙨𝙤𝙣 𝙨𝙝𝙤𝙬𝙨 𝙢𝙚 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙖𝙙𝙨 𝙩𝙝𝙖𝙩 𝙜𝙤 𝙞𝙣 𝙝𝙞𝙨 𝙥𝙖𝙥𝙚𝙧: 𝙗𝙞𝙜, 𝙗𝙤𝙡𝙙, 𝙘𝙤𝙡𝙤𝙪𝙧𝙛𝙪𝙡 𝙤𝙣𝙚-𝙥𝙖𝙜𝙚 𝙨𝙥𝙧𝙚𝙖𝙙𝙚𝙧𝙨 𝙤𝙛 𝙡𝙤𝙘𝙖𝙡 𝙗𝙪𝙨𝙞𝙣𝙚𝙨𝙨𝙚𝙨. 𝙏𝙝𝙚𝙣 𝙝𝙚 𝙨𝙝𝙤𝙬𝙨 𝙢𝙚 𝙝𝙞𝙨 𝙥𝙝𝙤𝙣𝙚 𝙨𝙘𝙧𝙚𝙚𝙣, 𝙬𝙝𝙞𝙘𝙝 𝙞𝙣 𝙘𝙤𝙢𝙥𝙖𝙧𝙞𝙨𝙤𝙣 𝙡𝙤𝙤𝙠𝙨 𝙨𝙢𝙖𝙡𝙡 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙪𝙣𝙖𝙨𝙨𝙪𝙢𝙞𝙣𝙜." If your local advertisers need a way to differentiate themselves, and be noticed, tell them to look up, and try, an old friend again. #newspapers #publishing #education #journalism And speaking of old friends, a tip of the hat to John Klem, for bringing this article to my attention.

The Effects of Itemlive on Digital Journalism This article delves into how itemlive is transforming the way we consume local news, its key features, and the benefits it offers to both readers and journalists. https://lnkd.in/e-x9ruik #itemlive #article #seo #technology #website

Honestly surprised it took them this long. With the right coordination, they can cover national news probably better if not just as good via their local and regional networks. Sounds like they will use Reuters to fill a few gaps, I assume at significant savings. In today’s age of less frequent print editions, smaller news holes and earlier print deadlines … the emphasis of what a print newspaper must offer its readers is changing. Which is why a lot of newspapers and chains have, are or will ponder similar moves. But obviously no one else really has Gannett’s scale. Hopefully by “reinvesting the savings,” they mean on more local reporters in the streets. AP also relies heavily on rewrites from Gannett papers (and some others, of course) to bolster its states coverage. In places like Iowa, days can go between stories moving on the state wire, and often they are simply day-old rewrites from a member newspaper. https://lnkd.in/e3r63ZCs

Print newspaper subscriptions of the top 25 titles continue to steeply fall. But digital subscriptions are up. Newspaper is just a technology; the journalism it carries continues to be valuable. One concern is how to maintain accessibility: a print newspaper can be read by anyone with access to the physical object once it's been bought, while a digital subscription can generally only be accessed by its owner. How can we best ensure that the most possible people get access to in-depth journalism that's relevant to them?

The old thrill of the newsroom wasn't quite revisited as I got the latest edition of The Lichfield and Burntwood Independent newspaper to press earlier this week - but that buzz of tearing up pages last minute to get a breaking story in before a late night print deadline was great to experience again after Lichfield's Sophie Capewell landed a gold medal and multiple world records. Launching a newspaper produced and distributed entirely by volunteers in their spare time has been a challenge, but is one that has been paying off ever since we started in March. Listening to feedback as we go out and about, it's clear there's still value in print alongside digital, but that people want the paper to be for and about their community primarily. I chuckled when one lady said she was "surprised how many local stories are in it" - perhaps audiences have forgotten what local newspapers should and can be? The unusual fortnightly collection model of distribution was something we were not sure would work, but it certainly has done with venues asking for more and more copies. There are also social and community benefits we hadn't anticipated, with people telling our distributors that going to pick up their paper every fortnight is getting them out and meeting up with people in a way they never did before, while newsagents are loving having people pop in to pick up a paper (and then grabbing something else too while they're there). We even have people collecting papers to deliver to their neighbours who can't get out and about. It's also been great to share my experience of running a paper as a volunteer with other publishers and journalists to help them think about following a similar path and walk them through some of the intricacies of the publishing process (and at least one of those is due to launch in the coming weeks which is great to see). Always happy to chat with anyone who might have thought about launching a paper but never thought it would be possible - just get in touch. The challenge of securing advertising and memberships to create a sustainable product in the longer term is ongoing, but we've been blessed to have brilliant support in both of those areas so far to allow us to keep the presses rolling, invest in photography (such as the images of Sophie Capewell from Paris) and build up a bit of a buffer should we need it in future. Telling advertisers and supporters about the benefits of local news and the impact on communities when news deserts exist has been hugely important and part of how we tell our unique story. Hopefully we'll see more and more come on board to help us secure local journalism for Lichfield, Burntwood and the surrounding villages in the long term. Long live local news!

RIP Contra Costa Independent newspaper, 40 years on Forty years ago today, I lost my first job as a journalist. The Contra Costa Independent newspaper, based in Richmond, California, was taken off life support and gasped its last, aged 74 years. I had started writing for its sister paper, the Berkeley Gazette, while still in grad school and became a full-time correspondent over time. The Indy, as we called it, was always going to die next month. The paper paid the same salaries as the much larger Bay Area papers, a non-union competitor started a new paper offering better ad rates and coverage. Things were so bad our photographer had to buy his own film and hope for reimbursement as the Indy had its credit cut off. He covered his beats in a beat-up Chevy Chevette. The rolls of newsprint were delivered in care of the funeral home owned by the family that also owned the paper; fittingly ironic. This situation inspired us all. We had nothing to lose and went after stories like newshounds. Corruption! Police brutality in Richmond (which led to a 60 Minutes segment)! Thirty-seven dead cats in a freezer! A jury laughing after sentencing a convicted killer to death! Great times and a crash course in daily newspaper reporting. I had the two best editors of my career while working at the Indy. Tim Porter, who started his career as a copy boy at the SF Examiner, was the managing editor. I still remember the day he phoned me in the press room at the county courthouse in Martinez after I had filed a story. “Bashor,” he yelled, “rethink your career in journalism!” I sat there, a bit shaken, only to have him call 10 minutes later: “Bashor, where’s that copy?!” A hard-ass lesson in writing better and meeting deadlines. Eric Newton was the city editor, bumped up to managing editor for the last stretch after Porter left. On the side of his CRT terminal, Eric had a post-it with two key points I still use to guide my writing: Issues, not events; and Significant, revealing details. A few other lessons learned: Get out and talk to people. Be nosy and ask lots of questions. Take chances. Take copious notes. Work fast. Ask “Why?” And put your readers’ interest first. When the Indy died, the owners owed me $2,000 in back pay. As a stringer, I was at the bottom of the pile of claims filed in bankruptcy court. I’m still waiting, but not holding my breath. Several months later, Eric Newton wrote an in-depth post mortem of the paper for Feedback, the SF State journalism review and included these warning signs.

According to a 2023 Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism survey, only 9% of the UK public are willing to pay for online news. Yet, roughly 60-70% of newspapers implement some form of paywall. With this in mind, we decided to investigate some of the success stories and failures, as well as dissect the different forms of paywalls implemented by publishers, all to answer the question: are they actually effective? Find out what we discovered: https://lnkd.in/d2etdD2n

Dear readers, You lose. Maybe that should've been the headline. More than 200 local newspapers -- owned by Gannett and McClatchy -- will no longer turn to the Associated Press (AP) and its journalists for stories. It will save... "in the “millions” of dollars, according to McClatchy brass — and said they will have no trouble filling the news gap." “We create more journalism every day than the AP,” Gannett executive Kristin Roberts said in a Tuesday memo. Read that again: -- no trouble FILLING the news gap. -- we CREATE more journalism every day than the AP. It's true. They will fill the gap. They will create content. But in this creator economy, don't confuse that with news. It is not a commitment to reporting (reporters cover news, they don't create it), nor is it a desire to create a model to replicate, replace or compete with AP's national/international coverage (that wouldn't be financially feasible given AP's 200 bureaus worldwide). It's the continuous decline of actual journalism in favor of advocacy journalism. Readers lose. Communities lose. My hometown daily (where my dad worked for 40-plus years taking pride in putting a quality product in people's hands pre-Gannett purchase), will be affected. Maybe yours will be, too. #journalism #news #reporting

I miss everything about the daily newspaper, a dying American artform. My generation - the 'boomers' - grew up with local papers. Newspapers were the glue in every community, large and small. Seven days a week, a newspaper arrived at the door. It was full of news, advertising, stock market, sports, gossip, politics, entertainment, opinions, comedy, graduations, weddings, occasions, religion, investigative journalism, events, cartoons and just about anything else that a person could want. Local papers connected communities and neighbors. The paper it was printed on - called newsprint - had an unforgettable smell, and the ink rubbed off on your hands. Newsprint was useful for many other things like wrapping stuff, protecting surfaces - and house training puppies and lining bird cages. Even then, newsprint was recycled...to make more newsprint. I was a paperboy from age 11 to 14, and nearly always the #1 paperboy in my hometown of Lincoln, NE, throwing over 100 papers on to the porches of homes, by bicycle, seven days a week, rain or shine, hot or cold - all by myself - without excuses. Monday thru Saturday, it was delivered in the afternoon, and on Sundays we had to have every paper delivered by 7AM. Every paperboy had their own technique for rolling papers, and most used rubber bands to do it. Every month, I had to knock on doors and collect from those customers, all by myself, and then pay the local newspaper, keeping some for myself. It was all cash, and the money was good. That job taught me about money, hard work, business, resilience, details, customer service, promptness, persistence, people and sales. I made a LOT of money for a kid, and won a lot of awards. Being a Lincoln Journal-Star paperboy was one of the most fun and rewarding jobs I've ever had. But times change. And sadly, the local paper is mostly extinct. Paper, logistics and labor costs have made all but the largest papers unsustainable. Being a paperboy today would be unsafe for a kid for many reasons. Today, people want information NOW, for little or no cost, whether it is accurate, helpful or even applicable to their lives. Media giants now control the flow and content of information. There is little real news, but a lot of opinion. The art and science of journalism is almost dead. And so, people have become divided and disconnected from one another. https://lnkd.in/gG9_uuSb There's a reason that I post on #LinkedIn and #X (or #Twitter). Social media is the best way for us to keep in touch with one another. But it is not a substitute for actually communicating directly with other real human beings. So, here's a suggestion: call, email or write a letter or card to someone you value. NO texts or instant messaging. Do it right now, today, and connect with them. You will both be happier as a result, my friends.