Will The Newspaper Become Obsolete?

The only way I can read the newspaper is to buy it only on Sunday morning, bring it home, sit down on the couch with a cup of coffee and READ it.

Sunday is the only day (and the occasional Thursday I remember to buy USA Today, for the book section) I do this. I get daily news in the car on the way to work and from email news summaries.

I've worked for three newspapers, and at each was encouraged to read our product every day it was published. Since I was in advertising we all were checking our ads, but we did linger over the headlines, Dear Abby, recipes, and human interest stories.

I miss those mornings. And I know I was better informed as a citizen. When I get news from the radio, half the time I'm not even listening because other things -- like driving! -- divert my attention.

When I do listen more carefully to a story, though, I'm usually asking questions when the reporter or anchor "signs off" on the story: Why did {the subject of the story} do that? How did they find him? Where are they looking for the victim? Who's involved in the scam?

We don't get those details - not much, if any, background - from electronic media. But the format of newspaper reportage does allow the space and greater in-depth research, and is therefore a far better informational vehicle.

There's only 20-22 minutes for the evening news when you allow time for the commercials. Radio also has its time limits, and you have to be somplace where there IS a radio.  Podcasts and news sites like CNN have to deliver their news in short, bite-size pieces because consumers demand easy-to-digest newsbites.

Writing this column, I am reminded how much I miss the daily read (and actually holding it my hands; I can't really get used to reading a computer screen).

Though I don't believe we'll see the complete demise of newsprint newspapers in my lifetime, I don't know that the industry can be saved or "come back" to be a viable and profitable. Between the digital tidal wave -- from the gadgets to the software --  the sheer mass of information to be disseminated, and a new generation of information-hungry-but-no time-to-get-it-the-old-fashioned-way technoloy savvy consumers, I believe "old-fashioned newspapers" will sadly, eventually, go the way of the squeaky voiced actors whose careers vanished overnight with the invention of "talkies."