"Without newspapers, from where will local TV newscasts procure the news they daily report?" An excellent question. One answer -- a partial one at best -- that we've seen play out already in this area is from local blogs.
Meanwhile, a couple of small CT papers are on the verge of death.
The N&R is lucky nobody bought it for anything close to the original, nine-figure asking price. Adding those debt payments to its deteriorating operating budget would make its current woes much worse.
The newspaper illuminati have been inviting us to their funerals for years now.
Posted by: Becky Ford | Nov 11, 2008 at 03:45 PM
The local TV stations are as bad as Dusty Dunn with regards to gathering their news via the morning papers. Unfortunately, the state AP bureau was also to blame as thesame stories ran on the press and TV wires - making it difficult to determine who originally reported a story.
The TV stations have at their advantage - their viewers don't read the paper, for the most part.
As for local bloggers, neither the TV nor the Newspapers are willing to go out on a limb there. With all the social media agregators, it won't be far off when you really can get all your news from one page.
Posted by: Don Moore | Nov 11, 2008 at 03:59 PM
The bigger question is without newspapers who will gather the news, period.
My personal wish for Christmas (besides world peace) is an unbiased, unflinching professional media outlet to expose the shenanigans that go on here everyday without relying on any news service except it's own news bureau.
There are plenty of people willing to talk, as evidenced by the local blogosphere, just no one to report it fairly and professionally.
Until that happens we shall remain locked in the grip of the self serving minions of Melvin who don't really want anything to change or grow here if they can't get a piece of it.
Ever wonder why Raleigh and Charlotte are not suffering an equally severe economic downturn as we are?
Posted by: Joe Wilson | Nov 11, 2008 at 05:39 PM
Ditto: Joe Wilson's comments.
Posted by: Billy The Blogging Poet | Nov 11, 2008 at 05:53 PM
ME TOO
DITTO : JOE WILSON'S COMMENTS.
Posted by: keith | Nov 11, 2008 at 07:48 PM
or as I like to call them the TREBIC CARTEL
Posted by: keith | Nov 11, 2008 at 07:49 PM
ME THREE/Ditto Joe.
Posted by: Dr. Mary Johnson | Nov 11, 2008 at 08:36 PM
I started out on one of the local newspapers that may go under in CT -- and no one is really going to pick up the local news slack in those areas.
Posted by: Joe Killian | Nov 11, 2008 at 09:38 PM
Joe Killian: "and no one is really going to pick up the local news slack in those areas."
Nobody at the N&R is picking up the local news slack is this area.
Posted by: Ben Holder | Nov 11, 2008 at 09:53 PM
There are sources of news out there that meet those qualifications.
Our new Greensboro online newspaper (greensborotelegram.com) does not rely on a news service and we also have unbiased professionals doing the reporting.
We're not on the scale of the News & Record, but you have to start somewhere.
By the way, in my fifteen years of running print and online newspapers, I've never had a problem with TV stations using news from the papers. It's when they don't attribute the source, that it becomes an issue.
Almost all of the time however, at least in our Raleigh market and at News14 statewide, I have seen the stations properly give credit where credit is due and we do the same at our paper.
Posted by: Randall | Nov 12, 2008 at 08:24 PM