Wash. Post columnist: Time to shut down the small papers

[SCEditor]

Checking in from a 16K family-owned daily in the south. No layoffs. No paycuts. Circulation is actually going up. The only thing we're struggling with is advertising, but that has more to do with the economy than anything else. Heck, as recent as August, we were setting records for advertising. Our prep football section had more ads in it than ever. I'm not bragging; I'm just trying to illustrate how stupid this idea is.

You hiring?

As of now, we're fully staffed. It's like I always say around here, "We're in no danger of losing anybody. Nobody's hiring."

 

[VJ]

Pretty sure I'll listen to someone who's won a Pulitzer over a random SportsJournalists.com poster.

While the small papers right now might be in better economic shape than Gannett or Tribune, that doesn't mean they will be 5 years from now.

 

[Drip]

Most Americans DO NOT live in metropolis areas. Obviously, he has not done his homework.

Either him, or you.

http://www.brookings.edu/articles/2008/1008_smalltowns_katz.aspx

But the 1910 census was the last one in which rural Americans represented a majority of the population; these days, we've become a thoroughly metropolitan nation. Two-thirds of our population lives in the top 100 metropolitan areas, and 84 percent of Americans live in all 363 metros. Being in a metro means being tied to someplace else; the Census Bureau defines metropolitan areas as a city of 50,000 or more, plus the adjacent counties that have close social and economic ties to the urban core.

and those people are often better-served by the podunk times as far as localized news. for instance, the dallas morning news supposedly serves a buttload of suburbs and adjacent counties but they do a lousy job of covering those suburbs and counties on a regular basis. and i'd bet it's the same way at other metro gorillas.

Your post answered exactly what I was going to say.

That's how you were going to respond to evidence supporting the fact that you made a sweeping statement that could not have been more wrong?

Actually I'm right in what I said. Just use common sense and look at the numbers.
But that is for another day. This is about a guy blaming smaller papers for the fall of bigger papers.

 

[Drip]

Pretty sure I'll listen to someone who's won a Pulitzer over a random SportsJournalists.com poster.

While the small papers right now might be in better economic shape than Gannett or Tribune, that doesn't mean they will be 5 years from now.

Why would you listen to him? Does he walk on water or something? What he's won doesn't have a bearing on what's going on now. I think you might be giving this guy too much credit.

 

[jgmacg]

Actually I'm right in what I said. Just use common sense and look at the numbers.

Here. Numbers. Look.

The United States is an urbanized nation, with 80.8% of its population of 305,186,613[1] residing in cities and suburbs as of mid-year 2005

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_the_United_States

 

[PeteyPirate]

Pretty sure I'll listen to someone who's won a Pulitzer over a random SportsJournalists.com poster.

While the small papers right now might be in better economic shape than Gannett or Tribune, that doesn't mean they will be 5 years from now.

Why would you listen to him? Does he walk on water or something? What he's won doesn't have a bearing on what's going on now. I think you might be giving this guy too much credit.

Does someone have to walk on water to be worth listening to?

By the way, I looked at the numbers again:

*Two-thirds of our population live in the top 100 metropolitan areas
*84 percent live in all 363 metros

Apply some common sense to that and tell me how "most Americans DO NOT live in metropolis (sic) areas."

 

[Jake_Taylor]

He's right about one thing. Being at a small daily I can tell you we don't offer a "full range of local, national and international news and features." We don't even try to offer a full range of international and national coverage and very few people complain. We're a local paper. We do a great job covering local stories and rely on the wires for regional coverage and customers are happy with that.

McDonald's doesn't a full range of gourmet options, they do what they do and that's great for them.

 

[Drip]

Pretty sure I'll listen to someone who's won a Pulitzer over a random SportsJournalists.com poster.

While the small papers right now might be in better economic shape than Gannett or Tribune, that doesn't mean they will be 5 years from now.

Why would you listen to him? Does he walk on water or something? What he's won doesn't have a bearing on what's going on now. I think you might be giving this guy too much credit.

Does someone have to walk on water to be worth listening to?

By the way, I looked at the numbers again:

*Two-thirds of our population live in the top 100 metropolitan areas
*84 percent live in all 363 metros

Apply some common sense to that and tell me how "most Americans DO NOT live in metropolis (sic) areas."

What is your source?

 

[Drip]

He's right about one thing. Being at a small daily I can tell you we don't offer a "full range of local, national and international news and features." We don't even try to offer a full range of international and national coverage and very few people complain. We're a local paper. We do a great job covering local stories and rely on the wires for regional coverage and customers are happy with that.

McDonald's doesn't a full range of gourmet options, they do what they do and that's great for them.

You said it best. The customers are happy.

 

[PeteyPirate]

Pretty sure I'll listen to someone who's won a Pulitzer over a random SportsJournalists.com poster.

While the small papers right now might be in better economic shape than Gannett or Tribune, that doesn't mean they will be 5 years from now.

Why would you listen to him? Does he walk on water or something? What he's won doesn't have a bearing on what's going on now. I think you might be giving this guy too much credit.

Does someone have to walk on water to be worth listening to?

By the way, I looked at the numbers again:

*Two-thirds of our population live in the top 100 metropolitan areas
*84 percent live in all 363 metros

Apply some common sense to that and tell me how "most Americans DO NOT live in metropolis (sic) areas."

What is your source?

Why do I need a source? You didn't question the accuracy of the numbers. You said someone needed to apply common sense to them.

 

[Drip]

Pretty sure I'll listen to someone who's won a Pulitzer over a random SportsJournalists.com poster.

While the small papers right now might be in better economic shape than Gannett or Tribune, that doesn't mean they will be 5 years from now.

Why would you listen to him? Does he walk on water or something? What he's won doesn't have a bearing on what's going on now. I think you might be giving this guy too much credit.

Does someone have to walk on water to be worth listening to?

By the way, I looked at the numbers again:

*Two-thirds of our population live in the top 100 metropolitan areas
*84 percent live in all 363 metros

Apply some common sense to that and tell me how "most Americans DO NOT live in metropolis (sic) areas."

What is your source?

Why do I need a source? You didn't question the accuracy of the numbers. You said someone needed to apply common sense to them.

Anyway,

 

[JayFarrar]

It doesn't take a rocket surgeon to realize that of those 363 metros, many are not what people would consider a metro area. The cutoff point is basically a little more than 100,000 people living not in the city, but in the area.
So Bay City, Mich. with its 107,517 people and checking in at No. 363 is a metro area. Or Anniston, Alabama, home of the finest small-town, family-owned newspapers in the country, and checking in at No. 350.
So you could live out in the wilds of Alabama and be as rural as they come, and still live in a metro area.
Back to the Post's guy's point, the Anniston Star, a paper that is also hugely profitable or at least was, should close so that the Washington Post can have a larger market share?
Really?