The Decline of Newspapers

[ysabetwordsmith]

This article examines some reasons why newspapers are diminishing, and why that's a serious problem:

Chris Hedges | Bad Days for Newsrooms - and Democracy
For Truthdig.com, Chris Hedges writes: "The decline of newspapers is not about the replacement of the antiquated technology of news print with the lightning speed of the Internet. It does not signal an inevitable and salutary change. It is not a form of progress. The decline of newspapers is about the rise of the corporate state, the loss of civic and public responsibility on the part of much of our entrepreneurial class and the intellectual poverty of our post-literate world, a world where information is conveyed primarily through rapidly moving images rather than print."

I am, of course, dismayed by the decline of journalism. But I'm not convinced that the blogosphere is quite as hopeless as made out in this article. I'm finding better global news online than offline. I'm using outside sources to confirm (or contradict) American sources. On my Friends list are blogs by Real Live Scientists, by artists and writers and other People of Culture. I know several individual and community journals that routinely interview people; interviews are traditionally considered Real News, and when well done, they can be very informative. I have a broad journalistic streak myself; I post reviews, local news, etc. and I'd like to do some interviews here if I can ever find time for that. There's hope -- if people choose to invest effort in serious journalism, it can be done online.

So what do you think about traditional print journalism vs. online journalism? Compare and contrast.