SO it goes …
Another newspaper succumbs to the digitalization of our mainstream culture. Ink and paper are finding it more and more difficult to survive the harping onslaught of computers and the world wide web. In this post, I continue my series on the crises facing traditional print newspapers. This time is the Albuquerque Tribune [see title^].
The Las Cruces Sun-News, a newspaper in Las Cruces, NM and subset of the MediaNews Group conglomerate based out of Denver, CO, reported the final day of the Albuquerque Tribune. The Tribune used to be one of Albuquerque’s highest circulated daily running about 42,000 issues distributed in the late 80′s. As of early 2008 the paper was down to a little over 9,000 issues. Its legacy had lasted almost 9 decades, being founded by Carlton Cole Magee as Magee’s Independent in 1922. The E.W. Scripps Company, an American media conglomerate, moved to sell the Tribune as of August 2007. If no buyer was found the paper would be officially shut down early 2008. As of February 23, 2008 the Albuquerque Tribune has issued its last edition with the headline, "Goodnight, Albuquerque".
E.W. Scripps Company owns 18 papers across the United States as well as several television networks such as HGTV, DIY, FineLiving, and the Food Network [of which I am a BIG FAN]. Apparently, Wikipedia reports that it has closed 3 newspapers based in Ohio,
- Birmingham Post-Herald (Birmingham, Alabama) (closed 2005)
- Cincinnati Post (Cincinnati, Ohio) (closed 2007)
- Cleveland Press (Cleveland, Ohio) (closed 1982)
as well as 6 other papers in Alabama, Texas, Tennessee, PA, and CA. It is a shame that print newspapers are slowly being put out of business by the increasing digital wave. I would hope that more print companies would embrace the digital age and instead of closing the paper, move the majority of it to the internet. Making a print newspaper available as an ‘Email Daily’ would possibly be an effective measure to combat falling distribution numbers. A few of the closed papers such as the Cincinnati Post have joined with others to put up News Websites where one to two former print papers could continue their local reporting. Methods such as these would cut down on having to layoff reporters and editors, as well as saving a good amount of capital from running printing presses.