The buzz over the future of news and the fate of newspapers has exploded since I last wrote about the topic in February. I’ve been following the conversation carefully as it has continued to manifest itself across the web as well as in print, but I’ve been reluctant to write too much about it. Hardly an article is written without either a wholesale indictment or wholesale exoneration of Google for blame in this drama, so I decided it was best to keep my thoughts to myself.
This is too important and fascinating a debate, though, for me to be content sitting completely on the sidelines. So I thought I would take some time to write not an argumentative post, but a prescriptive (or at least predictive) one that offers what I think might be a successful model for the future of written journalism.
A little over a week ago, Mike Arrington posed a fairly radical hypothetical: what if the best 5-10% of the New York Times‘ reporters walked out and started their own company? A lean staff count and modest production expenses for this web-based enterprise would allow plenty of budget for investigative journalism and other expensive reporting. ”How many private equity funds would kill to put $100 million behind the ["New" New York Times] to make sure the company had plenty of money until it reached profitability?” ponders Arrington. ”My guess is plenty. [...] And I know a couple of hedge funds that would be right there, too. I know this because they’ve pitched me on a vision not much different than this one.”
Arrington’s proposal was inspired by a recent fascination with Politico, whose leadership he met prior to their interview with Charlie Rose. Profiled by Michael Wolff in this month’s Vanity Fair, Politico is the web-based Bible of political junkies that rose to prominence during the 2008 election season and has sustained more modest, but nonetheless impressive growth. Both the article and Rose’s conversation with some of the staff are worth checking out.
Arrington fails (or declines?) to draw the connection between Politico and his own web publication, TechCrunch, and as a result does not recognize the disconnect between their shared model and his “New New York Times” proposal. It is indeed an innovative idea to take the cream of the journalistic crop, free them from the burden of a bureaucratic and expensive print-based publication, and set them on a new (and hopefully profitable) course of news reporting. But the Arrington hypothetical only addresses one of two major problems with written journalism today.
Continue reading ‘Turning The Wrecking Ball of News Into A Bola’
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