Wednesday, May 6, 2009
So writes Jeff Jacoby and he's right. The always promised but never quite fulfilled demise of The Boston Globe is not due to its shameless leftist tilt. I wish it were true, but I don't believe it is. Massachusetts is so left-leaning that you can drive from Stockbridge to Boston and never have the displeasure of setting eyes on a centrist, let alone a real conservative (you'd never see me, I'm too busy sitting inside blogging). There's plenty of market here to reward a lefty paper. It's just not happening because legacy media everywhere is suffering from market changes akin to the disappearance of the buggy whip. Jacoby:
...if liberal media bias is the explanation, why are undeniably left-of-center papers like the Globe, The New York Times, and the San Francisco Chronicle attracting more readers than ever when visitors to their websites are taken into account? How does liberal bias explain the shutdown of Denver's more conservative Rocky Mountain News, but not the more liberal Denver Post? How does it explain the collapse of newspapers in lefty enclaves like Seattle and San Francisco? How does it explain why the great majority of Americans -- 60 percent, according to a recent CBS/New York Times poll -- get most of their news from television?
Newspapers are in extremis not because of their political agenda, but because the world around them has been transformed. The growth of the Internet has left the traditional newspaper business model, with its vast physical plant and armies of writers, editors, photographers, pressmen, mailers, truck drivers, and salesmen, in a shambles. Craigslist and its ilk have vaporized what used to be the top profit center at most newspapers: classified advertising. A decades-long trend of falling readership, brought on by the rise of television, has been accelerated to warp speed by the explosion of websites and blogs offering news and opinion on every conceivable subject, 24 hours a day -- and usually for free...
What's the solution? Gerard directs his particular brilliance toward finding answers and opportunities in a new series of posts that begin here: The Slipstream Media: Creating a New American Network - Part 1
I'll look forward to future installments.
While I agree that legacy media is suffering for reasons other than Leftwing bias....Leftwing bias is playing a major role in these outfits demise. Why you ask?
Because the huge numbers of Leftwing biased media outlets are having to compete with each other for viewers/readers.....and the increase in bandwidth has allowed Conservative media outlets to flourish....and consequently all these old school Leftwingers no longer have a monopoly and the Conservative readers and viewers fled to the new media Conservative outlets....leaving the Leftwing media to share amongst themselves a smaller pie....while at the sametime increased bandwidth means that they have to compete with each other for the same smaller pie of viewer/readers.
Fox News beat MSNBCs and CNNs ratings combined in April.
Quote:
April Ratings: FNC Beats CNN and MSNBC Combined
How's this for cable news domination - Fox News beat CNN and MSNBC combined in every hour from 6amET to MidnightET in both Total Viewers and the A25-54 demo for April 2009.
FNC had the top 11 cable news programs in Total Viewers and 12 of the top 15 in the demo. FNC is the #2 network in Total Viewers on all of cable.
From 9amET on, every program grew by more than 60% in the demo. The 5pmET hour, now occupied by Glenn Beck, is up 212% in the demo and up 128% in Total Viewers. Your World with Neil Cavuto is up 102% in the demo and up 60% in Total Viewers. On the Record with Greta Van Susteren is up 75% in demo and up 55% in Total Viewers. Also in demo: FOX Report is up 75%, Special Report 70%, The O'Reilly Factor 74% and Hannity 64%.
Fox & Friends has now been #1 for 90 consecutive months, Studio B with Shepard Smith for 80 consecutive months.
End Quote
http://www.mediabistro.com/tvnewser/ratings/april_ratings_fnc_beats_cnn_and_msnbc_combined_115179.asp
Hey, that's a good point, actually. But then again, who is the Globe's competitor in Boston? There isn't really anyone in their class, so it's hard to make the argument that their market on the left is split.
Solomon, the Boston Globe now has to compete with every Leftwing newspaper in the state, region, and nation even internationally with English language newspapers around the globe as well as other media such as television even the BBC....because of the Internet.
I actually like Cathy Young who is published in the Boston Globe often. But she is more marketable than the sum of the Boston Globe.
The only real advantage that the Globe has(or any Newspaper) is its local coverage. Yet it failed to cover the recent Boston Tea Party....this of course drives away (or keeps away) customers in their shrinking market....and thus helps lead to their demise as a sustainable business model.
Yeah, that's why I can't watch Fox anymore outside of Red Eye occasionally if I happen to be up which is hilarious.
Now I'm filled up on Fox Kool Aid and find myself watching CNN or even MSNBC occasionally...
Oreilly goes on and on and on about how evil NBC is and how the NY Times and "liberal media" is suffering because the people are leaving them due to their "left wing bias"... enough with his personal life being inserted into the news.... that's why Krugman was so nauseating with Bush.....
it's the same in reverse with EgoEilly...
The newspapers are suffering bcs people would rather read Drudge in 2 seconds and then occasionally read the paper while eating... the days of reading the paper to actually hear what's going on in the world are diminishing with Cable Network "News" and the instaneousness of the Internet - not just blogs - google etc...
CJ was right though when he said the news business will be in bad shape if places like the NY Times don't exist in the future or have to rely solely on Reuters etc.. for stories...
Bloggers NEED newspapers to be around...