the newspaper business

Hello NAA Readers, here’s my comment in a more readable form

Good lord. You folks are killing me with these long diatribes on what you all think is wrong, what needs to be fixed, and what your predictions are for the future.

Taken as a whole, since this blog has started, it would be a full time job to read, think about and respond.

Let me just address one issue you raised.

Advertising is news. You cite verticals that have made a successful transition to the web. But most naysayers overlook the biggest category of advertising - Retail ROP and Preprints. It will take a huge national rollout of 20mbps broadband (NOT just DSL) and a cheap monitor to view the information before Retail Advertising can make a successful transition.

Since broadband rollout is controlled by telecos and cable who need a return on investment satisfactory to investors, it will be a long time coming to reach penetration to serve the big box retailers.

Newspapers are OK as long as telecos and cable keep broadband speeds down (no incentive to increase speed) and local governments do not see broadband as essential infrastructure like electricity, water, sewer, streets, etc.

When that change comes then options for delivering Retail ROP and preprints via the internet become real.

Since no HTML or returns are recognized, I’ve already written more than anybody will ever read.

Nice job keeping discussion in as clunky a format as possible. Ever hear of WordPress?

UPDATE: Had I read the first post in the new NAA Blog (does anybody?) I wouldn’t have wasted my time. The latest post explains that NAA asked 22 people to do “essays.”  Not blog posts - essays.

So NAA approached 22 A listers and had them lecture to those of use who actually work at a newspaper.

I’m not subscribing to the RSS feed anymore. Let them talk among themselves. I’ve attempted to interact with the A listers before, and they really don’t want to hear from peons like me.

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 18th, 2007 at 9:16 pm and is filed under Future of Newspapers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.