Why Newspapers Fail
June 5, 2012
Quote to note: I don’t want to “shirk” my responsibility to highlight interesting management analysis. My source is the free Wall Street Journal. On the Web site appeared a three page letter allegedly penned by Warren Buffett, icon of American business and Bill Gates’s pal. The subject is the investment uplift for newspapers. The write up explains that some newspapers have value. But here’s the quote to note:
Times are certainly far tougher today than they used to be for newspapers. Circulation nationally will continue to slip and in some cases plunge. But American papers have only failed when one or more of the following factors was present (1) The town or city had two or more competing dailies; (2) The paper lost its position as the primary source of information important to its readers or (3) The town or city did not have a pervasive self-identity.
The question becomes, “If the formula is so obvious what has baffled so many newspaper publishers?” I will have to wait for an azure chip consultant, an academic, or an unemployed webmaster to give me the answer. In the meantime, I will check news on my iPad and catch local info via Twitter.
Stephen E Arnold, June 5, 2012
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