An idealist's perpective on the future of newspapers

This is the second post I start like this, but seldom do I feel more like an idealist than when I say that newspapers are not on their way to extinction. Not because I do not believe it, but because of everyone's condescending reaction when I make that statement.

I become even more enraged when people link the "end of newspapers" with "the end of journalism." Well, unless societies stop needing to be informed, to get the facts they need to make informed decisions; unless societies stop needing watchdogs in government, from the presidency to community and union organizers, no, journalism is not ending.

Granted, we are in a period of transition, and the business of newspapering has become tight, exclusive, more competitive. As the authors of Wikipedia's page on the "Future of Newspapers" write, nearly one third of print publications have ceased publishing due to financial circumstances. Some of them, at not finding buyers for even the most popular and distinctive newspapers, have had to file for bankruptcy. Some have had to stop printing and began to publish only online (Newsweek is a good example). But that is the business aspect, and journalists are not businessmen and women, we are writers, we are researchers, we are interviewers. As Howard Reich, the renowned jazz critic and author from the Chicago Tribune once said, journalists need to let businesses take care of business and focus on producing content that is worth reading.

We have a duty to our readers. We have a duty to society.

Skimming through Wikipedia's page can be depressing for those of us who have spent years of our lives dreaming to land a job in a good print publication. Yes, from everyone in our journalism classes to the web, to one after another pundit in TV and radio, we have heard that the job market is tight and print journalism is not as smart a choice as broadcast or digital.

If I'd get a dollar for every time I've been told "You could work writing memos" or "Why didn't you choose (insert any other job, mostly related to business, here)," I would have the money that journalism is, according to them, never going to make me.

Yes, reading through that Wikipedia page can be depressing. Indeed, phrases such as "shuttered or drastically pruned" have a powerful effect on those who love and expect to live from this profession. But as many act as prophets of doom for this industry, I cannot help but think of how much this so-called "end" is actually a transition, a transformation. After all, newspapers and their staffs are still the sources for all the news out there. As the Wikipedia article mentions, TV doesn't have the time and blogs don't have the resources to produce content. 

If we talk about fact-checking and whistleblowing, newspapers have been pioneers. Our main constraints--the news cycle and the time we need to get everything in print--actually work, in some way, for our advantage, as they allow us to fact-check and be more picky with what we put on paper.

Bottom line: TV needs us. Bloggers need us. Society needs us. We set the standard.

Perhaps this is the greatest news of our times: Newspapers are not going anywhere.

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