With TV, radio, and internet access at home, at work, and on mobile phones, what is the point of newspapers? If people want the latest headlines, sports scores, stock prices, and sales, they can turn on the TV, turn on the radio, or visit Yahoo!, CNN, ESPN, or Amazon for free. Yet, millions of people across the U.S. still spend 50 cents every morning to carry around 100-page newspapers, read day-old information, and get ink all over their hands. It doesn’t make sense. The majority of newspaper content is useless advertisements anyway.
Do most individuals use newspapers to sell things anymore? No, they use eBay, Amazon, and Craig’s List. Do they use newspapers to look for jobs anymore? No, they use HotJobs, Monster, and Craig’s List. Even the New York Times crossword puzzle can be downloaded and printed on demand.
Fifty years ago, newspapers were great. They were 1958’s equivalent to the internet. They allowed everyone to have fast access to information, but fifty years later, with our modern alternatives and environmental awareness, do we really need to keep wasting tons of paper, ink, and energy printing newspapers 365 days a year?
I agree about the wasting of them, but I also don’t think the general public is even close to being willing to use a computer or some sort of device to receive news. The cost of the device would prohibit that.
As for getting rid of newspaper readers, well, what else are you supposed to read while you’re in the bathroom?
I’m not talking about releasing a special new news-reading device. The general public already uses devices to receive news: radios, computers, and TVs. In the car, people listen to the radio, which receives news broadcasts. At work, people check yahoo.com or cnn.com for the latest news stories. At home, people watch the local 6:00 news or 10:00 news.
With most people already getting their news from at least one of these sources, what’s the point of newspapers? They’re obsolete…a pointless, dead format.
The same goes for magazines. Internet access and cable TV are so widespread now, that magazine readership has been steadily declining for several years. Who needs three-week-old news when they can get up-to-the-minute news on TV or online?
There is quite a bit of local news and features partaken in a newspaper. Also many world-wide pieces done by say the New York Times. Much of this might go away if they can’t sell it to anyone. If it were up to me, I wouldn’t buy any of them. However, much of the news you read for free on the internet would have to be charged for.
I understand that without newspapers, companies would have to start charging for online news subscriptions. That’s fine. People already pay for newspapers anyway.
If anything, online news subscriptions would be better than newspaper subscriptions because there’d be fewer ads, they’d be cheaper, they’d feature audio clips, video clips, and reader comments, and the news would be up-to-the-minute instead of a day old…plus, the environmental benefits.