Newspapers Ahoy

   Let me start by saying that I am a certified newspaper addict. My day is incomplete if I don’t scan the newspaper everyday. And it’s not any newspaper that will do. It has to be a something which has some credible journalism, interesting editorials, and is a powerhouse of trivia. In fact whenever I move to a new city, I am not settled in, till I find the perfect newspaper.

   Few weeks ago I was faced with a peculiar problem. My newspaper kept getting misplaced at the hostel reception (where its delivered) everyday. My classes start before my newspaper comes and consequently when I return in the evening, its missing. Irritated and desperate, I was searching for alternatives. And voila! The internet, as always, comes to my rescue. I found the fabulous e-paper the newspaper group has set up. And above all it’s free. It’s in the regular print format, so it’s very easy to adapt to. You can scan the newspaper (just hover the pointer on the pages), u don’t need to open the entire page for the headlines.

   It got me thinking; why would a person now pay up for a subscription when it’s more convenient to read it online and you get it for free? It doesn’t make sense. And as it turns out, I am right. All the recent surveys both in India and abroad indicate that print newspaper readership is going down. Full time professional employment at daily newspapers is falling. In a desperate attempt to offset the falling revenues, more newspaper groups are setting them up online. Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp declared an increase of only 1.09billion $ from last year’s 1 billion $. It has set up an online service. For free. New York Times and Washington Post have come up with an ingenious solution. They have come up with 15 minute dumb down version of their newspapers, available for free at the subways. It serves to whet reader’s appetite with the main stories, and consequently directs them to the full fledged online or print version.

   So what about the losses they would have to suffer because of loss of subscribers, I ask? The subscriptions contribute to a very small amount of total revenues. Advertisements form the major part of the pie. As it is advertisements have shifted focus to online advertisements. Online advertisements revenue’s up by 30% a year. It’s more convenient from the customer’s point of view. Take my case; I have been hunting for a laptop. While reading the e-paper, I came across Dell’s new range of notebooks, and by clicking on it; I was taken directly to the website, where I could compare the prices.

  Online services also provide opportunities for an instant dialogue that can be opened up on any topic that include blogs, message boards. We all know the important role blogs played in Priyadarshini Mattoo’s case.

  Still for the online journalism, to become a major economic engine, the experts say, it will take another 10 years before it can equal print assuming a 33% growth/year. But, the winds of change are blowing already. Whether it will be a disaster or a revolution for journalism remains to be seen.

-Akanksha Jain