Read All About It or at Least Read Something About Some of It

The Sydney Morning Herald has adopted a tabloid format after over a century and a half as a broadsheet. Traditionalists everywhere will no doubt sigh in despair at this evidence of declining standards.  I wouldn't worry too much about that, for a traditionalist pretty much everything is evidence of declining standards "We didn't have any of this namby pamby fire shit when I was a boy.  We just ate our meat raw like real men.  And flu, give me a break, it was plague or it was nothing."  If traditionalists are genuinely worried about newspapers they might give more attention to declining circulation than declining standards. The simple fact of the matter is this is likely to be little more than a final spasmodic jerk before the Herald slides into its grave.  You can almost smell a whiff of decay about it when you buy the paper (although that may just be the cheap printers ink they use).

Still if this is a genuine attempt at rejuvenation rather than a last wave before sinking forever then there are a couple of things that the publishers should be aware of.  Firstly a sober and restrained front page works fine for a broadsheet where people are essentially buying snob value.  It doesn't work so well for a tabloid when half the people who buy it do so to clean up their dogs crap.  At first glance the Sydney Morning Herald now looks rather like the Blue Mountains Gazette which, while a fine paper in its own way, is probably not going to rescue the Herald's circulation figures.  I realise that it is early days but I'm rapidly coming to the conclusion that the Herald may not have any later days.  Take a lesson from the Telegraph which has been doing this a lot longer than you and get those multi syllable words off the front page.  Bigger pictures, bold font, emotive (and short) words.  I realise that you're probably trying to preserve as much of the old Herald as possible but lets face it if that was going to work then it would still be a broadsheet wouldn't it?

Print media is dying.  This is hardly an insightful or original comment.  It has been noticed around the world.  Frankly I suspect that print media will cling to life for probably about as long as Rupert Murdoch does.  When he goes the last press baron who genuinely loves newspapers will have departed and I doubt if print media in any serious form will long survive him.  The task facing newspaper publishers today is to squeeze as much money as possible out of a terminally ill cash cow while setting up the electronic media platforms which are going to be their source of revenue in future decades.  Actually providing some news content for these platforms would be nice but is probably not essential.

Actually I wonder if news content is necessary at all.  Pretty much every political and social commentator plus every ill informed halfwit with an axe to grind has a blog these days (yes I am aware of the irony).  On top of this most sporting codes upload the results of their matches and drug tests to the internet and every political, business and charitable organisation has online press releases.  Running a media platform should consist of nothing more than gathering together a bunch of links to various sites in one place and then charging advertisers for space on it.  Don't try charging your readership, they will always be able to access the information elsewhere with a little effort.

Some people might point out that simply providing access to a group of vested interests and special pleaders is hardly a substitute for fearless, independent journalism.  To which I respond that this method has served the media pretty well in print and I don't see why it shouldn't translate to electronic media as well.  The idea of an independent press impartially reporting the news of the day is pretty much a myth propagated by (you guessed it) the media.  Virtually every newspaper in existence came into being not because the owner wanted the public better informed but because the owner wanted the public to think more like them.  Along the way, and largely as an accidental byproduct, a lot of important stories got broken and the public found out some things that it otherwise mightn't.  I see no reason why this should cease to be the case simply because people are pushing their views on the internet rather than dead trees.  In the meantime I shall continue to read the Herald; on the internet as long as they don't charge for it and in my local cafe once they do.  Who actually buys a newspaper nowadays?