As I drove home from class last evening, I was mostly distracted, but MPR’s “The Story” was playing in the background. I noted that the topic of last night’s edition was in regards to the failing of Denver, Colorado’s newspaper. I wasn’t actively engaged, but tuned in when a female reporter was being interviewed. She mentioned how the newspaper staff is currently working for free and recreating the newspaper online. They are hoping to make enough money charging people for an online subscription. She believes this enterprise can be successful as the newspaper won’t have the overhead of printing, delivering etc. I tuned in when she mentioned that she also taught journalism at the college.
I was particularly interested because of this class. I wondered about her students because, as newspapers seem to be failing all over the country, it seems that journalism is not a very lucrative career choice.
She mentioned that it is rare for any of her journalism students to even have a subscription to any paper. It seemed shocking to her that student s interested in journalism wouldn’t commit to reading the local paper. She talked about how she was tired of being “the dinosaur in the front of the classroom.”
So, she has recently begun paying attention to technology. She began dappering in online journalism. She talked about how students don’t want to read papers, but want local news available to them via their iPhones. She had to update her vision and accept how current students want their news delivered. The format is much different than that of just a generation ago.
Her story was bittersweet. She talked of her longing to wake up in the morning to the thud of the paper being tossed on her porch. The disappearance of her job and her newspaper has completely changed her life. But her story made me think about how I teach my class and how I still bring in newspaper and magazine articles to be read, analyzed, and discussed. Perhaps I, too, need to move on. Analyzing websites isn’t enough any longer. How much longer will any paper be around?
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I too wait for the thud of the newspaper on my front step and read the local paper with my morning coffee.
ReplyDeleteMy son reads his paper(s) online.
I hear that the Mass Comm department at school is retooling fast to prepare students for the online writing environment students will hope to encounter in their jobs.....
I was just reading about this in Newsweek, they were discussing the demise of the Seattle PI. I have asked my students if they read newspapers, and very few do. I still enjoy reading actual newspapers, but this seems to be a dying medium. I wonder how many Mass Comm students actually realize this.
ReplyDeleteYesterday as I was navigating an on-line magazine, and having to endure the video advertisements that introduced each article I wanted to read, I began to think maybe print magazines won't die after all.
ReplyDeleteWhen you are reading a print magazine or paper you can easily ignore ads you're not interested in. Maybe people will get tired of all the ads online and long for the day they could read a magazine or newspaper article uninterrupted by advertisements.