Would you try to stop a departing customer by slowing down your service?
Philadelphia Inquirer has done just that, with managing editor Mike Leary announcing no news stories will be posted on its web site until they have been previously printed in the hardcopy newspaper and delivered on readers' doors. His memo to staff notes,
What that means is that we won't post those stories online until they're in print. We'll cooperate with philly.com, as we do now, in preparing extensive online packages to accompany our enterprising work. But we'll make the decision to press the button on the online packages only when readers are able to pick up The Inquirer on their doorstep or on the newsstand.
In a world where consumers learn about earthquakes in China in two seconds via Twitter, and in which The New York Times publishes its upcoming Sunday magazine stories on its web site the prior Thursday afternoon, the world's hunger for instant news kills any competitor who isn't fast. The idea of a major city publication slowing down to try to stop the migration of readers to the internet is rather comical.
Mr. Leary has made a basic, strategic flaw. If the Philly Inquirer were the only news game in town, tightening the reigns on the information release could stimulate demand for the print paper. But bloggers, wire feeds, social media, and national web sites all provide most of the information in the local paper -- and a block on the Inquirer will cause readers, like water, to flow elsewhere.
The Inquirer's circulation is following the national trend off a cliff, with daily print circ down 5.12% in just the past year. Bloggers are already talking about setting up new competition.
Via Dirk. Photo: I Like.
2 comments:
The dailies I work for have gone the opposite direction, with both aggressively switching to a strong on-line presence and a 24-hour news cycle.
The thing is, 99% of the national and international news in these dailies is available elsewhere on the Internet, and probably better presented there, too. I think dailies need to figure out how to be much more local, and emphasize the strength of their columnists, if they're any good.
It’s the Amish influence.
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