KOPEL: Web, not bias, offing papers

The Rocky

Published December 13, 2008 at 12:05 a.m.

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December 13, 2008

9:34 a.m.

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TheHawkReformer writes:

I agree with your argument that the insufferable media bias, which peaked this year to help elect a poorly-understood presidential candidate, is the primary cause of the decline of newspapers. However, calling it a "ludicrous" notion is going too far.

When a business encounters difficult times, it looks for every opportunity to tighten up its belt and re-engage its customers. The mainstream media had a chance to stand tall again on the shoulders of the likes of Murrow, Brinkley, Huntley and Cronkite--but you chose to go down in flames instead.

The liberal media bias didn't cause your downfall, but it isn't winning you a lot of sympathy, either. Because of what they are I won't miss any of today's failing mainstream media outlets, but I will miss what they could have been.

Seth Livingston
http://www.hawk-reformer.com
December 13, 2008

9:39 a.m.

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Brix57 writes:

The author mentioned several reasons for newspapers decline and presented reasons that were interesting, but from an odd slant of view.
Before the JOA, I got a full year of the Post, Monday through Sunday for $3.00 a year. After the JOA the price went up to $72.00 a year. No, I did not resubscribe.
Many polls have been done throughout the years by newspapers and others, an item that kept appearing in these polls was that readers wanted much more local news. Many of the newspapers ignored the results and printed more and more articles that were based hundreds of miles away. The polls also showed that they wanted more local writers. Papers ignored this and many printed stories written by people again hundreds of miles away. Polls showed that the readers wanted crime reported in their neighborhoods and what the police were doing. They wanted to know what happened to those that were arrested and the sentences given. Unless the crime was sensational, readers got nothing.
Many people wanted the investigative articles on politicians, corruption, poor businesses and the like. What we got locally was how wonderful ANY politician was, that corruption does not exist in Colorado and that any business that had a license to operate were wonderful places to work.
During the recent voting, both newspapers totally ignored candidates that were not either Republican or Democrat. Up until a couple of days before November 4th, even their Voter Guide had absolutely nothing on other candidates and their platforms. That killed any mail-in ballots, which were allowed weeks before.
The Web has provided what the local newspapers refused to do and that was to get the local news out there.
December 13, 2008

9:56 a.m.

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CL writes:

That the web is killing newspapers should be obvious, yet I keep hearing many conservatives insist that their decline is due to liberal bias. Unfortunately, Dave didn't point out that of the RMN and DP it is the more conservative of the two that is going under. I would like to hear why that is. I think that would make for a good, serious, discussion - any takers or will we just hear from the bomb throwers?
December 13, 2008

10:10 a.m.

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JohnHKennedy writes:

PLEASE, enough with the whining and blaming of CraigsList for your fall from grace.

Reinvent the Rocky. You all have known that this day has been coming. You and Scripps just failed to do anything meaningful about it.

Try an employee buyout. Find a local billionaire to buy it (cheap) and make it a crusading, muckraking paper.

Volunteer to take huge pay cuts to keep it alive. If GM workers can be asked to do it, so can you. Do that quickly so Scripps will see that you care enough to make it worth their taking the risk to save it.

Drop the 7 day publication model. Go to three day publication, Tuesday or Wednesday, Thursday or Friday, and Sunday. The Rocky doesn't need to be a daily to be profitable or to be a great defender of the people. Try charging a minimal fee for access to the online paper, $20/year maybe, I'll pay it ( but put the entire paper online, all of it). Consider the competitive advantages to getting out of the Joint Operating Agreement ( or staying in as a 3 day paper).

Give Denver's financially strapped readers new reasons to spend our hard earned money to buy your high priced subscriptions. Drop the price. Declare war again on the Post. Make the Rocky exciting. Make us anxious to see tomorrows new and revealing headlines.

Cut your advertising rates. Compete. After the JOA, your rates went sky high. You really think that didn't hurt Denver merchants and eventually the Rocky.

Don't just be a cheerleader for whatever party or president that is power. Hold them all accountable. Be fierce. Make the Constitution your standard and guide. Pillory any leaders that abuse their power or play games with the truth. Show us you are dedicated to the truth and to the Constitution and that you are reliable, that you always show up to defend both, no matter what party gets mud on its face, And Then We'll support you.

If you truly believe that readers nationwide didn't notice that most major newspapers became cheerleaders for Bush and Cheney no matter what lie they told, what law or provision of the Constitution they broke, than You Weren't Paying Attention.

We were.

John H Kennedy, Denver, CO
December 13, 2008

10:22 a.m.

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durangojim writes:

I for one hardly ever look at Craigslist. I have for years read newspapers, but have recently cancled two subscriptions. Most newspapers could now be called opinion papers. The downfall of the news paper industry does not surprise me. If you want the Rocky Mountain News to survive as a news soure keep opinions in the opinion section and report the news.
December 13, 2008

10:46 a.m.

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anya writes:

If your business model is failing, either go out of business or change your business model. The Internet isn't killing news, it's killing newspapers. Perhaps explore not printing any paper and JUST go on-line - If you do that, you are going to have to display advertising better on your website than you do now; you do it very badly at present.

Drop all of the national and international news; we can get that from many much better sources. What is hard to get now is local Denver metro news and Colorado news; cover that in clear well-written detail and your web traffic will increase. Clarify what is news and what is opinion so that they are distinct; that is the problem with Westword and a few others right now, news and opinion are all jumbled together.

It's a new world, change or go out of business.
December 13, 2008

11:01 a.m.

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anderson writes:

Mr. Kopel's last paragraph is pretty funny.

His charge of "extreme bias" (citing Mark Halperin) raises these questions:
--what sort of bias? (he refers to pro-Obama bias, but are we supposed to infer other bias as well?)
--bias where? The implied charge that "the" media (a monolith) is biased is sort of meaningless given the different variety of views out there in the mainstream.
--what is the effect of the bias? Are we less informed? Or does the charge of bias mean that my point of view was given less space than I thought it should have?

Kopel doesn't give us much in the way of context to understand Halperin's remarks.
December 13, 2008

11:03 a.m.

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HopiMedicineMan writes:

The Web killing print media is only one wedge in the poison pie. It is the prevailing myth among insiders. Bias, though rampant, is not part of the equation, says the unabashed Littwin, but he’s unconvincing. Here’re the unabashed facts.
Writers are liberals who write for a liberal readership. Liberals are more likely to read the paper on line. The conservative base, that buys the subscriptions, was abandoned. And who enjoys being lectured by their kids? Think about what you became, John Temple.
The Craigslist argument is really about an inability to compete, either on-line or in the paper. Move classifieds to the Net and make space for Jake Jabs.
According to IRIS.org, liberal newspapers in America are declining and conservative papers are growing. Why should this trend escape the Rocky? You can’t be all things to all people. This newspaper offended its conservative readership. Reporters were permitted their own agendas. This was the New York Time reading the paper front to back. Conservatives, to stomach the paper, read back to front.
The Rocky used to cover the suburbs, then, oddly, left it to suburban weeklies and an insert posing no threat. This paper found it’s identity in the 1970s, short, to the point stories, lots of ads. It was ugly. There were no Pulitzers, but it existed on a formula that would have a better chance of seeing the paper through this era.
Liberal newspapers support causes that aren’t revenue producing. Even in the 1960s, an oil discovery was front page. Oil meant jobs, and an endangered species called money. There was a symbiotic relationship considered unethical by today’s standards. Instead the paper covered expanding government, with no potential for increasing ad revenues. Instead of an oil writer, we have an environmental writer. We no longer read about bbls per hour, but about migrating antelope.
Liberal papers take no responsibility for their failings. So they gloss over them with a hit and run explanation, having the last word and headline credibility. The facts aren’t even entertained. The Web is killing print media. Don’t bother me with the facts.
The columns were wasted on me. I’d read Littwin occasionally, more laughing at him than with him. I don’t care what he thinks. He’s definitely never walked a mile in my moccasins. Griego passed along the same liberal clichés as Littwin in looooong columns. Her last word was the most expensive word in the newspaper. Temple forgot he was publishing a tabloid.
The advertising hole was too small in relation to the news hole. Chasing Pulitzers maybe ain’t such a good idea when the cost is your publication. Liberal bias killed this paper, if it indeed dies.
December 13, 2008

11:22 a.m.

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The_Punnisher writes:

See my post in the other story in the Rocky.

The experiment with YourHub works in my case. I go to it to get LOCAL news...that may be the DNA future...
December 13, 2008

11:58 a.m.

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troopermsu writes:

I subscribed to RMN when I moved here in 1998. I quit the subscription this year because the carrier couldn't get the paper to me before 6:30am. So lack of reliability of service delivery is also a factor in my opinion.
December 13, 2008

12:10 p.m.

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fatheromalley writes:

I've owned three businesses. The cities where I began these always had two papers. Which? Bang for buck? Divide the amount of subscriptions by the price per line/inch.
Advertising is a function of popularity for any paper. A business looks at the amount of hits which is subscriptions as well as general sales based on papers sold, not papers distributed.

To say that popularity is a function of advertising indicates little experience as a business purchacing advertising.

Undoubtedly the Web has bled some advertising away, but Dave's example of placing a classified ad for a teacher is not an ordinary ad. If Dave would have said a car, stereo, television he would have carried more believability with his logic.

All the Rocky would have had to do is create a site like Craig's list with the same business model and don't fall victim to commercial advertising on those pages.

The Rocky, with its superior resources at the time, could have competed very well, but they did not adapt.

I don't want conservative or liberal. I want facts that are not massaged to fit someone's ideology. In that the Rocky has failed miserably. Aliens vs Immigrants, Obama associations and real beliefs in "collectivism", global warming advertising posing as news stories, Bill Ritter cover-up attempt to falsely accuse a good ICE agent of criminal activity..remember Corie Vorhees?

I'm referring to their coverage during the election, not their too little, too late trial coverage.

I imagine that business advertising looks at that too.

How much does ideology play in advertising dollar? Little if there is no choice involved between the papers.

People insist on saying the Rocky is center right. This only shows that these people have forgotten what being center is.

I guess so when the average socialist now is called liberal. Centrist now is the old "left". They compromise their freedoms almost as freely as the old left.

Yeah, we can afford to give up that freedom and add another mandate for "the greater good".

The Right is now the extreme right lumped in with skin heads and white supremists and abortion activists. . This is another myth perpetrated subtly by the Rocky. What a crock! Because conservatives do not wish to give up their freedoms they are called the "polarizers" instead of those that wish to take your freedoms away.. and that has no bearing on advertising dollar?

In Dave's dreams?

Many reasons can be attributed to the Rocky's current problems, but saying there is no market for the simple truth is as ignorant of David as he claims his readers to be..

I know David, blame it on the "stupid" voters (subscribers) when you lose is the usual pointing game. It's really too bad that John Temple and David can only bring out of this, "It's Craig's list". It shows they've learned little and only face further failures..

David, I got your rooster..

Love you anyway,
Father O'Malley
December 13, 2008

12:32 p.m.

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dwschulze writes:

I pay for a subscription to the Wall Street Journal online edition. WSJ has never depended on classified ad revenues so CraigsList isn't a threat to them. People pay for the content and advertisers pay to present their offerings to the WSJs subscribers. The WSJ offers content that is different or better than you can get elsewhere and they've made it work.

Why can't that work for the RMN and DP? It would require a dramatically different kind of publication. Here's my guess at how it might work.

Local readers would buy a subscription primarily for coverage of local and regional news and events. The RMN and DP would have to focus on local and regional news and events like they've never done before. They would have to be keenly tuned into what their readers interests are. National and international events would be secondary.

They local and regional content would have to be good enough to attract paying subscribers and digital advertisers. Classified ads still generate significant revenue even with CraigsList.

This model all depends on the quality and depth of their local / regional coverage. Agenda journalism would be out. Bias may not have killed the RMN, but they will have to lose the bias if they are to reinvent themselves under this model.
December 13, 2008

12:46 p.m.

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anderson writes:

What is "agenda journalism"? The witchhunt of Ward Churchill? Any examples you could provide would help. What "bias" does the RMN need to lose to be viable?
December 13, 2008

12:56 p.m.

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Ewood writes:

I still subscribe to the Rocky, but it's getting harder and harder to take. For all the whining about the "liberal media," I find myself gagging almost every morning at the poor quality and heavy handed "conservative" pounding which pervades your editorial page.

Michelle Malkin? Are you kidding me? If I want right-wing talking points and lies, I know where to go- KOA and Fox News. That's not what I subscribe to a so-called "mainstream" newspaper for.

I love newspapers, and have subscribed to them my whole life. But as far as I'm concerned, it the quality of the Rocky which drives me to the internet. You guys, Kopel included, are on borrowed time as far as I'm concerned, and it's nothing more than sentimentality and habit which keep your pathetic rag on my breakfast table every morning.

If you don't start trying a little harder, you'll go down the tubes, and rightly so. It's time for Vincent Carroll to go.

E'wood
December 13, 2008

1:48 p.m.

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OneFly writes:

Below is a comment taken from another article addressing the issue of why papers are failing. It fits here as well.

Even after all this time newspapers/pundits/writers have failed to have or get a clue why the influence you had at one time is so much less now and in this case why newspapers are failing.

It's simple-you didn't do your job and whored yourselves out for the bottom line. If you had done so we would not be in Iraq now. People would have been tried for the worst act of treason in the history of our country in the outing of Valerie Plame. The list is endless.

Instead you took the centrist position of negating most factual accounts with an opposing view. There are enough participants now who have chosen not to be part of this anymore and instead canceled subscriptions and advertising and use other sources on the web mostly independent bloggers many who back their posts up with the facts and we ain't coming back.

In respect to this paper today the story on the Funding Board was to be continued on page 40 but is nowhere to be found. Then the filler piece always from AP on “Shoppers cutting back for holidays”. We already know that but maybe readers would like to read something they haven't heard over and over.

This papers choice to use the web is correct but to think people will pay in any numbers to make it viable when they can get better content elsewhere is being naive.

No matter what the papers and the rest of the media say because of the last eight years of lies,deception,war,massivive amounts of death and a ruined economy that very well may lead to a world wide depression this country has taken a left turn for sure.

I will read this bloggers post and agree with it because the ones that read lefty blogs are the ones who have stopped supporting newspapers.

http://liberality-liberal.blogspot.co...
December 13, 2008

2:35 p.m.

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quikshot writes:

I have been a long-time subscriber to the News even as they removed and deleted one attraction after another, such as the Empire Magazine insert, reduced the size of their delivery area, eliminated the TV and Radio Guide, and comics replaced by cartoons that are not very comical. Then I began to notice a reduction in comprehensive 'local news', an increase of 'glowing' attributes to the commercial and political "PR Releases". and news stories that died from a lack of follow up, but I find it hard to believe that political bias played any part in the problems that confront all newspaper publishers.
All of these changes occured over the years, but I still continue to subscribe to the Rocky, even while on it's last legs. Whether the Rocky can be saved is beyond me, but the Denver region is large enough to support two daily papers, or should be able to, once some chages are made
More bang for the buck would not hurt!.
December 13, 2008

3:06 p.m.

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TimeLord writes:

"I’d read Littwin occasionally, more laughing at him than with him."

Coming from you that's priceless. I probably laugh at your whines more than anyone except LT. Still not a single con who can explain why if the failure is due to lack of a right-wing philosophy, none of you can start and run a newspaper successfully. Keep up the good snivel, FakeMedicineBoy.
December 13, 2008

4:06 p.m.

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dwschulze writes:

Anderson writes:

"What is 'agenda journalism'?"

You're kidding, right? Did you read Dave Kopel's article above which includes this quote from a media executive: "extreme bias, extreme pro-Obama coverage."

A good example of agenda journalism that the Rocky should lose is Vince Carroll's shameless advocacy in favor of Jared Polis.

Keep reading the Denver Post. I'm sure you won't notice any agendas there.
December 13, 2008

4:10 p.m.

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tommytoons writes:

I quite agree that newspapers which once were so important in our urban society, are not now as important. One reason submitted is that craigslist is at fault, perhaps that is a partial explaination to the popularity decline of the RMN and DP, but, there are other reasons that need to be examined. Cost of producing a daily newspaper, paper, ink, production, salaries. Bad management choices just as with the big 3!

Both papers raised their rates, but instead of more news for the rate increase we got more advertisements than news, If I wanted advertisements, ironic, to say so I would go online to view them. I want news, not yellow journalism. Reporters need to tell me whats happening, when it happened, what outcomes are there are a result to the story...feeding me the reporters "opinion" is not a concern to me, I will develop my own opinion thank you very much. The newspapers have tried to compete with Television News, and they have lost...your model of reporting is not up to date in this era of instantaneous answers and news.

Too save your newspapers, drop the paper, and go strickly online and report news, weather and sports from a metro perspective, and a State perspective, live national and world news, to the big boys. As your reputation for solid journalism increases and your readship climbs, then start with some national news on how it impacts our local scene.

I don't want to see either paper vanish, just want it to meet my needs in todays society and I think you can accomplish this.
December 13, 2008

5:07 p.m.

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Achilles writes:

As a former subscriber to the RMN, I can tell of a few factors that led to my cancellation.

Firstly, liberal bias mattered to me. The RMN relies heavily on the Associated Press for stories. The AP disgusts me.

Secondly, the idea of my subscription fee being used to pay for Campos, Littwin, and Griego disgusted me.

Thirdly, the Sunday paper was The Denver Post. The DP disgusts me.

Fourthly, the stories were boring. I flipped through the paper in five minutes. After a while, I merely brought it from my driveway and placed directly into the trash - plastic wrapping and all.

Fifthly, the paper lacks a defining personality. It is a boring paper written by boring old men. I'm not sure of a single business other than the newspaper business that would pay Littwin more than two cents for his talents.

Bias in general is not the problem. I want a biased paper - a conservatively biased paper. That is the way paper used to be. You had your Federalist papers and you had your Republican papers. Now, we have only varying degrees of Democrat papers.

The newspaper's veil of objectivity is a transparent one. It serves to annoy more than promote feelings of honesty. Conservatives do not despise the general media because of its left-leaning bias. We despise them because they wear a cloak of objectivity while using their pen as a partisan dagger.

The usual retort is to exclaim that without objectivity the people will not receive the full story. Yet, I consider myself very much informed. And I only subscribe to "biased" publications, be they on the left or the right of political spectrum.

The very liberal New Yorker magazine arrives in my mailbox each week along with the very conservative National Review. Neither magazine attempts to draw that obnoxious yet transparent veil of objectivity over their work.

So, while I despise the viewpoint of The New Yorker magazine, I read it every week with the understanding that they make no attempt to hide their true feelings.
December 13, 2008

5:08 p.m.

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Achilles writes:

Furthermore, this blaming of Craigslist is nonsense. That website is the digital equivalent of a telephone directory book. It is as about low-tech as you can get in this time of evolving technology. Why not create your own version of the website? Why not improve upon and use your hard-copy business to further bolster the service?

And, it must be asked, if your problem is one of reduced advertisement rates, why not change your profit model? Can you not think of numerous alternatives? I can. I have been saying for the past two years that I would write a paper outlining the various improvements that could be made to the newspaper business that would allow the RMN to stay afloat.

I am still debating writing such a paper. Would you listen? There are so many ideas I have spinning around in my mind that it vexes me why you have not thought of them or why you have not created a forum to solicit ideas. There are so many ways to incorporate new technologies and attitudes into the newspaper business.
December 13, 2008

5:51 p.m.

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Achilles writes:

"More and more people are so intellectually lazy that reading one romance novel per year is too much effort." - Kopel

True words, indeed.

So, why pander to that level of laziness? That is exactly what the RMN does. The thought being that an intellectually inferior audience would only buy a paper that meets their level.

But, in my humble opinion, the more intellectually inferior the reader, the more they want to seem superior.

This is why so many beautiful women wear thick, dark, square-framed eye-glasses; they want to appear smart because they are so aware that they might be perceived as otherwise.

The RMN needs to create an identity of intellectual superiority and a strong cultural image.

The RMN should not strive to be the western version of the NY Post. This is Colorado not New York. Be a Coloradan newspaper. Find a Coloradan voice, appearance, and stature and stick with it proudly.

The newspaper's design has become so clean that it is devoid of personality. The font is especially boring. Why not adopt a western font that lets readers know they are reading a distinctively Coloradan paper?

I designed my own version of what I think a Coloradan paper should look like. I did this about a year ago. I never sent it to the RMN because I didn't think anyone pay any attention to it. Now that you are on your death-bed, I wonder if you've accepted your fate without a fight.
December 13, 2008

7:57 p.m.

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Spencer writes:

there has always been bias. The Internet is new. I stopped taking the paper because I was tired of the clutter.
December 13, 2008

8:13 p.m.

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freethinker07 writes:

I got curious about how Craigslist supports it'self. In Denver they charge no fees nor do they have ads. Their website says

"Q: How does craigslist support its operations?
A: By charging below-market fees for job ads in 10 cities, and for brokered apartment listings in NYC."

Years ago we used to get free maps when we had our cars filled with gas. Self service killed that.

We used to have more attractive, well made, individually fitted clothing provided by tailors. Automation killed that.

We used to have high quality service and meals on airlines. Deregulation killed that.

It used to be that newspapers were local monopolies like Qwest and Xcel. The telephone monopoly and the newspaper monopoly were killed by the web.

Politically, the anomaly I find in the death of the newspaper industry is that none of the environmentalists are cheering the fact that we aren't going to be shipping as many dead trees around as we used to. I canceled my Rocky subscription for environmental reasons. I believe that any environmentalist who is receiving a dead tree newspaper subscription is hypocritical.
December 13, 2008

9:53 p.m.

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peterpi writes:

quikshot @ 2:35pm, the "Empire" magazine was put out by the Denver Post. I can't recall whether the RMN had an equivalent. But if your general point was that the local papers abandoned local coverage, I'd probably agree with you somewhat.
Even when an undoubtedly conservative columnist like Kopel states the "bias keilled the RMN" argument is a myth, you guys still cling to it.
Go ahead, watch or listen to only what you want to hear. But don't wake up one day shocked, shocked! that what you want to hear isn't the whole truth.
December 14, 2008

8:48 a.m.

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Achilles writes:

"I believe that any environmentalist who is receiving a dead tree newspaper subscription is hypocritical." - freethinker

Stop using paper and we destroy corporate incentive to grow more trees.

Think of all the beef we consume each year, yet cows are plentiful. Why is that? Because there is profit in raising cattle.

As long as the paper industry (and the lumber industry) is profitable, trees will be plentiful.

This view is also shared by the founder of Greenpeace.
December 14, 2008

7:04 p.m.

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ProgressiveLiberal writes:

I can’t speak for anyone else but I did give up my subscription to the Denver Post due to media bias. I remember the day I cancelled my subscription was the day the Denver Post and the Rocky Mountain News endorsed George W. Bush for president. I had been reading several articles in the Denver Post that had a conservative bias and in my opinion down right lies regarding the facts. After this occurred numerous times I began to realize that it was in fact biased in favor of conservative ideologues. I knew at the time I cancelled that the owners of the Denver Post owned the Rocky Mountain News so a subscription to the Rocky Mountain News was not an option.

Reading newspapers were an addiction for me and I would traipse down to the end of the driveway every morning for my fix. I was however discouraged that the newspaper was no longer a reliable source of information or they were busy entertaining subscribers vs. telling the truth. This is the only reason I cancelled.

I don’t think the owners of major media outlets and newspapers have the option to report the truth anymore. They are run by a few corporatists and they will not write the truth about their advertisers. I started to go to sources where I knew I would get better information. I do occasionally enjoy a New York Times story when it has uncovered corruption but I now focus on other sources of information such as Paul Krugman’s books or blogs (the 2008 Nobel Prize winner for economics) and the Huffington Post and Raw Story for breaking news. Our country is in a world of hurt Mr. Kopel and you do us a disservice by denying that the Denver Post and the Rocky Mountain News have become a mouth piece for right wing and corporatists’ propaganda.

And I don’t buy your assumption that Craig’s list and other free websites for news and classifieds are the reason because the Rocky Mountain News had the ability to go head to head with these services but instead chose to keep the newspaper in the traditional format while everyone and everything around them were in the 21st century of the world wide web. People want the truth Mr. Kopel. Anything less is an insult to our intelligence.

Sincerely,
Marcie Jacobs
Parker, CO
December 15, 2008

10:55 a.m.

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sstnt writes:

Certainly craigslist has hurt classified advertising and therefore the newspapers. But lots of people don't use craigslist. These are also the people that would tend to subscribe and read papers. They are the people that papers have turned off through liberal bias. Obviously the previous writer must be so hard left a liberal that slight liberal bias seems conservative to her. Newspapers have turned off a large section of the very people most likely to support their paper. Who subscribes to papers? Would the demographic be more white or minority? More middle class or poorer? More older or younger? I think white, middle-class, older. The people that are more conservative and voted more republican? The people the editors, reporters, and newsrooms with their slight but pervasive liberal bias have turned off and who are departing your paper, as well as the Post? The people that would have been reading and using classified ads, if they were still reading your papers?
December 15, 2008

10:56 a.m.

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anderson writes:

Ms. Jacobs, our political views may be similar, but I don't know how you can proclaim holding "the truth". It's evident that there are different points of view in the world and that mine (or yours) isn't the only one. As to the Post's or the RMN's perceived "bias" I have to ask what I asked before: to what effect? Does this mean they are not good sources of information?

I was very skeptical of the push to war in Iraq (in which the NY Times played an important role in support of Bush's position). That does not mean I would not read it. I did more or less stop listening to NPR at the time but their tacit support of the invasion was just the straw that broke the camel's back.
December 19, 2008

2:38 p.m.

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gshevlin writes:

The main reason I have abandoned print and mainstream media (with a few exceptions) has little to do with any allegations of "bias". Allegations of bias usually originate from the belief that a source of information should act as a mirror to one's current viewpoint, which is a belief that I reject. I can talk to myself in a mirror and get my opinions reflected back at me. Why do I need to pay money to have the same effect from reading a newspaper?
There is no obligation on media outlets to conform to the biases and opinions of their readers. Instead they should be focussing on fundamental competencies like basic fact-checking, investigation of issues, understanding of nuance. You know, stuff that will permit them to write a story that doesn't look like it was assembled in 15 minutes or less by a complete idiot or somebody who started from the conclusion and worked backwards.
The real reason that print and media outlets are in trouble is related to basic competency. "Bias" is a red herring that people can produce as a stick with which to beat information sources with which they disagree, but to discuss bias is going to allow us to get trapped into debating superficial symptoms without addressing root causes.
December 21, 2008

10:24 p.m.

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drumdance writes:

"All the Rocky would have had to do is create a site like Craig's list with the same business model and don't fall victim to commercial advertising on those pages."

A lot of people have tried that and failed. Craigslist is successful because it's global in scope and completely free except in a handful of markets. Craigslist is very profitable, but their revenues are tiny compared to what a major-market newspaper needs to be successful.

And it's not just Craigslist, it's also sites dedicated to job searching and real estate. They've taken local revenues from newspapers.

To those who say "I don't buy from Craigslist" - THAT DOESN'T MATTER. What matters is that a seller can move merchandise there. I rarely browse Craigslist either, but I've used it to rent out a spare bedroom (multiple times), sell a computer, even sell a car, and it cost me nothing. I've also used it several times to hire employees.

In the pre-Internet era I would've had to use classifieds. No longer. I happen to like the Rocky, but I think they're doomed because the business model no longer works. Likewise, Blockbuster will eventually be overwhelmed by Netflix and Amazon, and that certainly has nothing to do with bias.

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KOPEL: Web, not bias, offing papers

The Rocky

Published December 13, 2008 at 12:05 a.m.

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