Ever since the advents of the Internet, online publishing, and now blogs, people have tooted (is that the right verb? anyhoo ... ) the clarion calls of the immiment demise of print media.
And now, the economic crisis have finally pushed one large newspaper to go 100% "web only":
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer will roll off the presses for the last time Tuesday, ending a 146-year run.
The Hearst Corp. announced Monday that it would stop publishing the newspaper, Seattle's oldest business, and cease delivery to more than 117,600 weekday readers.
The company, however, said it will maintain seattlepi.com, making it the nation's largest daily newspaper to shift to an entirely digital news product.
"Tonight we'll be putting the paper to bed for the last time," Editor and Publisher Roger Oglesby told a silent newsroom Monday morning. "But the bloodline will live on."
In a news release, Hearst CEO Frank Bennack Jr. said, "Our goal now is to turn seattlepi.com into the leading news and information portal in the region."
Link (Photo: Joshua Trujillo/P-I)
I think its sad.
I mean, it's great that we can read all the newspapers online for free, but how is that going to pay salaries? The only solution I can think of is offering content for subscriptions.
Save the trees; kill a newspaper.
Interesting that the demise of this newspaper is blamed on the economy and not the management. I'd hazard a guess that the paper was in serious trouble before the economy headed south.