I always felt that once the New York Times stopped printing, newspapers will cease to exist. Last week Arianna Huffington tweeted a link to an article saying that the paper will stop printing sometime in the near future, probably in the next five years. It really got me thinking how the news industry has changed over the last decade and how things would change if newspaper stopped printing.
When the Montreal Gazette decided not to print anymore Sunday newspapers, I had a conversation with my parents about how the newspaper industry is dying and how it would affect our lives. We basically came to the conclusion that it's very much a generation issue, where until about maybe 10-15 years ago the newspaper was essentially the only means of getting the news. Nowadays, thanks to the Internet, we are able to get up to the minute news, and don’t have to wait until the next morning before we read about it.
To illustrate the transition of papers going online, the best example I can give is the Montreal Gazette sports section, with the website habsinsideout.com. The website which started 5 years ago is now getting over a million hits per month and has become a good forum for both writers and fans. This just goes to show that people will always need news and there are ways to profit from writing online.
With newspapers dying and more blogs and media outlets appearing, it seems as if we are very close to losing the newspaper in the next few years. Will it affect me personally? I don’t really think so, I'm perfectly fine reading of my laptop or IPad when I drink my coffee. But for many it will be a tough transition. Hopefully people will be able to adjust and realize that new sources of media are quite an improvement (to be discussed next week).
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