copydude Posted December 23, 2010 Share Posted December 23, 2010 Dead Tree Press Is Dying Noticed this on political betting.com. It's hardly unexpected with the increase of online activity but it is interesting to see which papers are shedding the most sales - 'The Times' being a case in point. 'The Times' is also the first of these (I think) to go behind a paywall on the net. Not sure whether that's a good or bad idea . . . it breaks habit for a lot of people. Also behind a paywall are things like the Telegraph crossword - £2.99 a month. I might buy on online paper every now and then if you got a proper PDF of the street edition - but you don't. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Austin Allegro Posted December 23, 2010 Share Posted December 23, 2010 Dead Tree Press Is Dying Noticed this on political betting.com. It's hardly unexpected with the increase of online activity but it is interesting to see which papers are shedding the most sales - 'The Times' being a case in point. 'The Times' is also the first of these (I think) to go behind a paywall on the net. Not sure whether that's a good or bad idea . . . it breaks habit for a lot of people. Also behind a paywall are things like the Telegraph crossword - £2.99 a month. I might buy on online paper every now and then if you got a proper PDF of the street edition - but you don't. It strikes me that there is a lot of duplication in the British press, eg: Sun, Star = same Mirror = same as the Sun except pro old-Labour trade unionism. Express, Mail = exactly the same Telegraph, Times, FT = more or less the same though the Times tends to be a bit more progressive and republican Indie, Guardian, Observer = same So it wouldn't surprise me if a lot of those papers go to the wall and we just get left with combinations. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OnlyMe Posted December 23, 2010 Share Posted December 23, 2010 Asia Times is good. Nearly all the UK papers you are paying to be advertised / lied to or dished up re-hashed rubbish. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GBdamo Posted December 23, 2010 Share Posted December 23, 2010 Jesus H, the mirror has lost some 48.5% of its readership, is that true? The editor will want to blame it on on-line activity but the truth is, they ae trying to force their opinion of news onto people and guess what? More and more people are refusing to pay for their pleasure. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
the_duke_of_hazzard Posted December 23, 2010 Share Posted December 23, 2010 It strikes me that there is a lot of duplication in the British press, eg: Sun, Star = same Mirror = same as the Sun except pro old-Labour trade unionism. Express, Mail = exactly the same Telegraph, Times, FT = more or less the same though the Times tends to be a bit more progressive and republican Indie, Guardian, Observer = same So it wouldn't surprise me if a lot of those papers go to the wall and we just get left with combinations. FT is a cut above. Miles different from the Times. V interesting that the FT is unaffected. Interesting also that it's the mid-brow papers that are really suffering. Chavs still don't use tinterweb so much I guess. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Executive Sadman Posted December 23, 2010 Share Posted December 23, 2010 The nations conscience, the Daily Mail is holding up reasonably, thank god. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
copydude Posted December 23, 2010 Author Share Posted December 23, 2010 The nations conscience, the Daily Mail is holding up reasonably, thank god. In terms of paper sales, yes. I think that shows what we all suspected, that Daily Mail readers haven't yet worked out how to use a computer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevemo Posted December 23, 2010 Share Posted December 23, 2010 Around here at least (Bournemouth area), the traditional paper round all but died out in the 1990's. This is important from the point of view of newspaper sales, as people would have a daily paper delivered, ie by inertia buying a paper every day. Once deliveries stopped, people had to make a positive effort every day to go out and buy a paper, and would probably miss days, perhaps only buying at weekends, or on days when a specific feature was included. Also, those who bought papers for TV listings now have this information through EPG's on satellite and Freeview. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
copydude Posted December 23, 2010 Author Share Posted December 23, 2010 Around here at least (Bournemouth area), the traditional paper round all but died out in the 1990's. This is important from the point of view of newspaper sales, as people would have a daily paper delivered, ie by inertia buying a paper every day. Once deliveries stopped, people had to make a positive effort every day to go out and buy a paper, and would probably miss days, perhaps only buying at weekends, or on days when a specific feature was included. Also, those who bought papers for TV listings now have this information through EPG's on satellite and Freeview. Hmmmmm. I really liked that comment. Makes total marketing sense. The more difficult it is to buy something, the less you buy. So, who killed the paper boy, in the same way that video killed the radio star? Minimum wage? Health and Safety? The EU? (They were against daily milk deliveries, the swines.) Or, to reference another thread, did some Nanny State see the need to protect 14 year old paper boys from the sexual attentions of 26 year old mums? In the old days, you could have got a research grant to pursue this valuable historical thesis, but now you'll have to take out an MA loan. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
interestrateripoff Posted December 23, 2010 Share Posted December 23, 2010 FT is a cut above. Miles different from the Times. V interesting that the FT is unaffected. Interesting also that it's the mid-brow papers that are really suffering. Chavs still don't use tinterweb so much I guess. Isn't the FT a bit of a specialist paper? Maybe if half the City got the sack perhaps it's readership would drop? Some big falls in sales, I hardly ever buy a newspaper. I may get the NOTW as I find it best for the football results which my son likes to read. To be honest if it wasn't for that I wouldn't buy any paper. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CrashedOutAndBurned Posted December 23, 2010 Share Posted December 23, 2010 It´s been decades since the newspaper delivered news, due to radio and TV, and so more and more it provides ´comment´. But anyone can ´comment´ on the internet on blogs and ´forums and as 90% of journalists are no more worthy of being listened to than Bob down the pub, the role of newspapers is hard to work out. Pilger and Fisk will sometimes put together a quality feature but most newspapers are just fluff. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SNACR Posted December 23, 2010 Share Posted December 23, 2010 Jesus H, the mirror has lost some 48.5% of its readership, is that true? The editor will want to blame it on on-line activity but the truth is, they ae trying to force their opinion of news onto people and guess what? More and more people are refusing to pay for their pleasure. That's, in fact, exactly what he does do mixed in with readers being hungry for mainly celebrity gossip moving to things like Heat mag. Definitely, no acknowledgement there's little appetite for looney/old left rhetoric - there's a lesson there for Ed Miliband. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
copydude Posted December 23, 2010 Author Share Posted December 23, 2010 It´s been decades since the newspaper delivered news, due to radio and TV, and so more and more it provides ´comment´. But anyone can ´comment´ on the internet on blogs and ´forums and as 90% of journalists are no more worthy of being listened to than Bob down the pub, the role of newspapers is hard to work out. But newspapers do deliver a very different menu of news. There have been plenty of studies into TV News reporting. As you might expect, if the news isn't visual . . . oh dear, media luvvie colleague. there ain't a video clip of anything . . . the news editor will decide it ain't news. The medium is the message, as our old friend McLuhan would always argue. And about blogs and tweets . . . this is for shorter concentration spans than interested readers. Strangely enough, with all the education cutbacks. there is still a market for people who want to read more than 140 characters about any subject plus a Twitpic. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
payback period Posted December 23, 2010 Share Posted December 23, 2010 Good find Copydude. Reckon the loss of Torygraph and TImes readers over last decade is due to OAP readership dying. Only used to buy the Evening Standard but don't have to now it's free. Has good business pages, obviously London news and horoscopes (for a giggle). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
'Bart' Posted December 23, 2010 Share Posted December 23, 2010 It´s been decades since the newspaper delivered news, due to radio and TV, and so more and more it provides ´comment´. I liked Charlie Brooker's description of some of them as "lifestyle comics". "They fill their pages with shit and garbage on a daily basis" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
porca misèria Posted December 24, 2010 Share Posted December 24, 2010 I might buy on online paper every now and then if you got a proper PDF of the street edition - but you don't. WTF would you want a PDF for? It's a lousy format for reading on a screen, even if the original is small enough to fit at a text size you can comfortably read (which isn't going to happen with a newspaper)! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MattW Posted December 31, 2010 Share Posted December 31, 2010 Unscientific observation: I'm currently working as a checkout operator at a supermarket as it seems that the Daily Mail is the most popular newspaper that I check through - even more so than the Sun or the Mirror! As a paper boy in the early 1990s, the Sun and the Mirror were the most popular dailies. Mind you, my deliveries were predominantly on the council estate where I grew up on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ruffneck Posted January 2, 2011 Share Posted January 2, 2011 The reason is obvious , people got tired of reading the same trumped up spin about the global warming con , terrorism and house prices. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
copydude Posted January 2, 2011 Author Share Posted January 2, 2011 WTF would you want a PDF for? It's a lousy format for reading on a screen, even if the original is small enough to fit at a text size you can comfortably read (which isn't going to happen with a newspaper)! Very good question. Simple answer: it's that online versions of newspapers are currently cut-down versions of street editions. I don't get the full story. Anyone can convert the font-size into something readable without a problem. But if there's nothing to read in the first place . . . There was a really interesting note the other day . . . hmmmm, not sure where I saw it, may have been Guido . . . . but paywalls are keeping not only readers out but also advertisers out. Oh dear, unintended consequences, Well, obvious, innit. The Dead Tree Press has to rethink it's strategy . . . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gone baby gone Posted January 2, 2011 Share Posted January 2, 2011 Once the internet reached a critical mass where there was plenty of user generated content like blogs, forums, etc. most peoples use for newspapers reduced to them being simply a source of news, not opinion. There are plenty of free online news sources like the BBC, CNN, Al Jazeera, etc. so it's probably best for the newspapers to either accept their new smaller niche, or change their content mix and even their way of operating if they want to grow not shrink. Attempting to charge fewer and fewer people more and more money just makes them looks silly and hastens their demise. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davedavies Posted January 2, 2011 Share Posted January 2, 2011 The reason is obvious , people got tired of reading the same trumped up spin about the global warming con , terrorism and house prices. Completely agree..I have cancelled by subscription to the Economist recently as I was tired of its refusal to be honest about the globull warming scam and unwillingness to properly identify the economic problems we have. Some people still see it as the cream of the crop though Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
winkie Posted January 2, 2011 Share Posted January 2, 2011 No reason to buy a daily paper anymore...it is only full of peoples options, you can find information you require from so many other places....there is always the free local rag and the metro to fill in those spare fleeting moments. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
happy_renting Posted January 2, 2011 Share Posted January 2, 2011 As you might expect, if the news isn't visual . . . oh dear, media luvvie colleague. there ain't a video clip of anything . . . the news editor will decide it ain't news. Hve you noticed how often the Beeb uses clips from a BBC show to illustrate a news item? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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