Comment 37494

By highwater (registered) | Posted January 27, 2010 at 15:27:00

This:

Even if there's consumer interest, the Apple tablet won't save journalism -- because it will be a massive distraction that will keep newsrooms from making the real changes that could keep us in business. I could go on for a couple of thousand words on this, but today I'll try to keep it short. The problem with newspapers isn't really not having the right technology. To survive, we need to change our whole worldview -- finding ways to encourage more dialogue with readers and more community involvement so that local readers feel they have a stake in this thing. And we also need to do a better job at the thing we claim to be already good at -- real journalism that makes a difference. To show what I mean, read this recent expose on the Washington Post to get a feel for how once-great news organizations have drifted so far off the track. If the Apple table has been around in 2003, we still would have screwed up the run-up to war in Iraq, and if it had been invented in 2007, we still would have missed the looming financial meltdown. How many stories we will miss now while the bosses upstairs are waiting for "Jesus" to suddenly deliver all the loaves and fishes of subscribers and cash.

Unless newspapers are giving readers what they need and what they want, it wouldn't matter if Steve Jobs invented a way to deliver the news via brain waves and ESP.

Comment edited by highwater on 2010-01-27 14:27:38

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