HOW WE GET OUR NEWS – AT 10:33 A.M. ET:  More proof of the decline of the American newspaper.  How much of this is the new technology, and how much is loss of confidence in an increasingly biased press?  From the Washington Examiner: 

The Bureau of Labor Statistics has been charting the demise of newspapers, and its latest numbers reveal what many in the industry have been witnessing. Newspaper employment, as of March, had dropped to 183,200, compared with 197,800 working in "Internet publishing and broadcasting."

An analysis by the Nieman Journalism Lab charts the beginning of the end of newspapers to the dawn of the Internet Age in 1990. That year, newspaper employment hit a peak of 457,800. It is down 60 percent.

Some print publications are dumping paper and going online while keeping many of their reporters, editors and administrative staff.

Said Nieman, "It's safe to assume that newspaper jobs will continue to evaporate. Most small and mid-sized metro papers are struggling to find new revenue as print advertising and circulation decline and online advertising fails to make up the difference."

COMMENT:  I can't see much future in print publishing.  However, it would have more of a future if readers felt it provided some compelling service.  But the decline in objectivity, agenda-driven journalism, and a kind of cultural arrogance, have combined – with technological change – to drive readers away.

While the death of newspapers has been announced before – in the early sixties, for example – I'm afraid this time the burial will actually follow.

June 17, 2016