Walking with dinosaurs

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The Old Man came down yesterday. Been a while since he and I talked and longer since that we'd sat down to talk.

Aside - where and how he became The Old Man and I became The Old Boy is lost to time. It probably started one night in college where we were roommates.

He came down yesterday to talk shop.

He and I, moreso he than me, are dinosaurs.

In college Ted Turner predicted the death of the American newspaper within a decade. We in J-school laughed him off. This was in the late 80s.

In 2011, The Old Man predicts within a year or two the newspaper he presently works for (a daily) either will not exist or will be substantially transformed into a something that bears little resemblance to the product today. He bemoaned the loss of two more editorial staff members from an already reduced newsroom.

Ted missed his mark by about 10 years or so.

Circulation is down. Advertising rates are up. News staff is cut.

Death by a million slow cuts.

I am less pessimistic than The Old Man because I work for a weekly newspaper. Weeklies are generally more immune to the pressures facing daily newspapers like his. While daily circulation drops, weeklies are either holding their own or growing in circulation. Most of 'em anyway.

'Crost the nation, some major dailies have already folded. Rockey Mountain News, Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Others have reduced the number of copies printed - Detroit Free Press.

My little- and I say "little" with a puffed chest, deepened voice and plenty of 'tood - newspaper has lost circulation. But I also note my community population has dropped about 1,000 people over the past 10 years. Figuring that in, plus people getting the internet version instead of the print version, we too are holding our own.

I could tell you my solution, but you're not interested in the detailed economics of newspapers. Neither am I, for that matter.

What does bother me is what bothers people intelligent enough to understand what a newspaper's death means.

It means you won't get information you want.

"I ain't getting it now," you say.

You are. You just don't realize it.

Two weeks ago, my newspaper sold out. I mean NO street copies left. Anywhere. It's been years since we did that. The story that sold out the paper was not covered by any other media for days. Even then it was only covered very briefly by a TV station with a solid reputation for not getting the stories correct.

Newspapers, especially those like mine, are the SOLE source of reliable and important community information.

No other media is going to tell my readers:

• What the local tax rate is going to be.

• What happened at the City Council, School Board, County Commission meeting, including details not found in the official minutes of those boards.

• Who got arrested.

• Who died. Yes you can look this up on the funeral home websites for local funerals. But no one else is going to tell you when someone from my community dies and has services and burial out of town.

• School honor roll. In some place, this may be on the school website.

• No other media is going to take the time to explain what local decisions mean to the average reader.

• No other media is going to hold local authorities accountable for their actions. Well, they will but only after the situation has exploded to the point state officials have to step in. I get fussed at frequently by local officials for printing what they say and do. Because of this, they watch their step.

You're welcome.

Who will do all this and more? No one else. You may not believe me. You may think the blogsphere and citizen journalism will step in and fill the void if newspapers are gone.

Wanna bet?

Generating this kind of information takes time and major effort. A lot of time. So much time, that I work full time doing it and get paid to do it full time. I often work MORE than full time - weekends and nights are part of my schedule. I STILL don't have time to cover everything that needs covering. I still don't have time to do the kind of research I need to do.

So I do the best I can with what I have.

You may believe the "Street Committee," talk on the street and discussions with your friends and neighbors can fill in the gap.

Pardon me while I break some ribs laughing.

Rumors quickly become certified facts with the Street Committee. Any fact that somehow DOES get out is quickly distorted, added to, subtracted from and generally perverted to the point that it has no relation to the original fact.

Come on. You know I'm telling the truth. You want to rely on that kind of information?

There are a few more reasons the blogsphere and citizen journalism can't fill in the gap completely. As an accredited journalist, I have immediate access to information that citizen journalists can't get to as quickly. I have developed sources for information - this takes time and requires regular visits and calls to renew these ties.

I know how to get information that people don't want to release. Do you?

I know how to edit stories for libel so I and the writer (in the case of letters to the editor) won't get sued. Do you?

If you already work a full time job, where are you going to find the time to wade through stacks of records, sit through meetings, rush from the office to somewhere to take a picture because it needs to be done right then? Are you going to be willing to get up at 4 a.m. to ride with law enforcement on a series of raids, that is if they are even willing to let you do this? They won't BTW. I get to ride because I an a professional journalist and I have insurance which specifically covers and protects me and the officers when I ride with them. You don't.

Point blank - I give you news and information no one else will give you. Doing this takes a lot of time, a lot of effort and money. I do have bills to pay so I will not do this job for free.

People need newspapers. They think they don't.

But sometimes you don't know you need something until it's gone.