Opinion: To Print or Not to Print

Comedian Dennis Miller once said if your job requires you to wear a plastic nametag, you’ve made a serious vocational error.

Miller’s mid-90s shtick was about flight attendants, but one can’t help but notice that journalists wear plastic nametags, too, and right now there are many, many newspaper employees wondering whether or not they’ve made a serious vocational error.

It is very tough for folks in the news industry these days and anyone who says different is full of hooey. To say the industry is in a state of flux is like saying the Titanic might have taken on a little water.

There are epic changes occurring for newspapers and their readers – and, oh yes, the journalists who have lives and families attached to their careers.

This week, nearly 100 Atlanta Journal Constitution employees must take a buy-out package or face the firing squad – and for some that might be one in the same.

The AJC is not alone. Earlier this month, the McClatchy Group, who owns the Charlotte Observer, the Miami Herald and other papers, reduced its workforce by 10 percent.

The Los Angeles Times and the Chicago Tribune also laid-off hundreds of professionals and dumped their editors.

The Wall Street Journal announced 95 new hires, this week, but those newbies will fill positions in news wire, web and international operations – not print jobs.

The New York Times reported last week that its advertising revenues were down 16.4 percent in June and second quarter profits were down 82 percent.

The Times offered voluntary buy-outs to about 100 newsroom employees this year. The uptick for the company is reportedly coming from their About.com Web site.

The Financial Times reported that the effects of high oil prices, a slowing economy and the housing crisis would weigh into advertising prospects for some time to come.

Gannett, the news chain that produces USA Today, reported a 36 percent drop off in second-quarter earnings.

The direction of the traditional newspaper – the kind that is black and white and read all over – is changing. It is changing as a result of readership and advertisers following their readers.

The real questions are: how fast is the change coming and how do news outlets make the conversion?

None of us has the time to commit to the full read of the morning read of the paper as we once did.

And good luck kicking back at your desk with the newspaper propped open in front of you. Nothing spells “fire me” like an employee slacking off at the office with the newspaper.

Quick news fixes are available online, and I absolutely cop to clicking around to see what’s going on, even though I am an old-school newspaper idealist.

Community newspaper editor or not, I read the AJC. I would no more confine myself to reading the community news then I would confine myself to reading only Georgia news.

It bothers me as a businessperson, and as a journalist, to know that people I have interacted with for many years are losing their jobs.

The AJC has already undergone one major staff reduction and now the organization is forced to make even more tough business decisions.

They will (we will) sacrifice a great deal of brain trust – people who have reported long enough in this town to know where the bones are buried – in order to make its business profitable.

The AJC grew into the suburbs years ago in response to population trends, but also to prevent the New York Times from expanding in Georgia. (That was a cool duel to the death battle!).

Love ‘em or hate ‘em, the AJC provides the daily news for Georgians in a way we community papers – or broadcast news outlets – cannot.

Their award-winning writers inspire all of us to become better at our craft. You may disagree with the angle of the story, but community papers cannot match the AJC’s reporting on issues that impact us all.

Their loss is our loss.

Community newspapers, once immune to the downward advertising spiral and the large overhead of the dailies, are impacted, too. The local businesses that advertise with us have been hit hard by the economic downturn and are struggling to find ways to reach customers.

The print advertising model, long embraced by large advertisers and many newspapers, is changing.

The new formula, suggests the Southern Newspapers Publishers’ Association, is one in which it will take five times as many online ads to equal one print ad. The association says it’s not a question of whether print formatting changes will occur – the news industry HAS gone online and the business model will need to catch up.

At The Post, we have experienced three paper price increases since January – a direct result of an international paper shortage. Our paper carriers are demanding more money to keep up with spiraling fuel costs, understandably so. And the struggle over the environmental impact of printing and throwing newspapers in driveways is ever-present.

The challenge for us is to deliver quality news in a format our readers want, that benefits our advertisers, and in a manner that sustains our own business. It’s a juggling act. But we have known since our beginning that online news was the right approach to a changing market.

For many journalists, writing is like breathing – it simply must happen in order to survive.

There are very few journalists who signed up for the profession as a get-rich-quick scheme. Most writers realized early on there is no big payout, but instead tap away on keyboards for the love of the craft, finding exactly the right word, getting that great story and telling it in a way that captivates the reader – hours of hard work for about four seconds of readership.

Because these days, four seconds is all the time we have to grab your attention. It’s no wonder, then, that online trumps print.

I am not licking my chops over the potential spillover of any AJC ad revenue because of their decreased local coverage. Instead, I am saddened that a local news leader is stumbling, impacting the lives of hundreds of Atlanta writers.

Competition is good. In the news industry, a nice competitive edge means better reporting and reading for you.

I salute the many news writers, editors and support staff at the AJC. Thanks for believing that telling it like it is, is where it’s at.

We’ve made the right decision.