Posted on 12/27/2010 5:54:22 AM PST by abb
The New Hampshire Union Leader and Sunday News and UnionLeader.com will make a major change in national and regional news, feature and photo providers as of Jan. 1, when they subscribe to both the Reuters America and the McClatchy-Tribune Information Services and end their membership in the Associated Press.
New Hampshire's only statewide newspapers and largest newspaper website will also continue to feature content from the Scripps Howard News Service and from the Washington-based Politico group.
Union Leader Corp. President and Publisher Joseph McQuaid said the move to Reuters and McClatchy offers editors a wider and deeper choice of content than did the AP, "but at a considerable savings, which we intend to use for more local coverage.''
Reuters America is part of the Thomson Reuters service, known globally for its strong financial content. It was recently launched as a general news service.
McClatchy-Tribune features material from hundreds of providers, including major newspapers such as the Chicago Tribune and Los Angeles Times.
McQuaid said the cost of Associated Press, coupled with its diminished New Hampshire coverage, were factors.
"We were providing more of AP's New Hampshire report than we were receiving,'' he said. "We would prefer that New Hampshire news consumers get that information directly from us.''
ping
Out of the frying pan into the frying pan
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/27/business/media/27movies.html?ref=business
Hollywood Moves Away From Middlebrow
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703548604576037500522813100.html?mod=WSJ_business_LeftSecondHighlights
As Oprah Network Readies, Team Tries to Keep It Real
I agree. 1/2 dozen = six.
If it's insightful and well written, they will survive, if it is crap they won't.
Since I’ve started my local newsblog (I cover city hall, school board, county commission, etc) I’ve come to the conclusion that local weeklies and such can be just as derelict in reporting as the NY Times or LA Times.
What happens is the smaller papers do a lucrative business publishing the “legal news,” such as sheriff’s sales, meeting minutes, delinquent tax notices, etc.
The publishers usually are not too keen on uncovering the brother-in-law deals that always happen in local government. Some of the papers would completely fold if it weren’t for the legal ads.
I stopped subscribing to my daily newspapers years ago when I realized they were only re-printing bland AP articles that I was getting off the Drudge report anyhow. Only the Wall Street Journal has anything to offer and now I get that online.
There is however a dearth of "local" news and if newspapers want to survive, they need to put some reporters back out on the street and focus on local news.
For example, my town paper (printed once a week) has a police blotter/fire log section. When I have occasion to see that paper, I go right to those logs but they always leave you wanting more information. For example, the police blotter will say "Report of deer attack on Steadman Street" or "Youths vandalizing cemetery" and leave it at that. Well, people want to know a little more than just that. Even "Cat up a Tree" might have a good backstory to it.
If the town paper put a couple reporters that focused on police activity alone, you'd have some pretty hard-hitting local stories to report and everybody in town would want to buy a copy or pay to see it online - because after all, we are all a bunch of nosy neighbors!
Then you have our local town politicians pretty much doing whatever they want because the local paper doesn't have the resources to cover them and the big-city papers don't care.
For newspapers, local news is where it's at but nobody is filling the void.
Little Joey mcquaid, the publisher at the UL is running the paper in to the ground. Dropping the AP is a good idea but using Reuters! Reuters has some of the most anti-American, leftist reporting, as bad as the NYT.
The UL is losing money so badly, they actually stopped delivery of their Saturday edition anywhere outside of Manchester and a few surrounding suburbs and they combined delivery routes with the Nauseous Telecrap aka Nashua Telegram.
Invoking the Loeb legacy and name for anything associated with today’s version of the UL is an abomination.
Re the story about the Union-Leader dumping the AP..I thought the AP was OWNED by its subscribers..so does the UL now SELL its stock in the AP, and more importantly , to WHO?
AP is a shameless propaganda organization.
Journalism was ruined when they started having courses in journalism in college.
“Out of the frying pan into the frying pan”
“For example, my town paper (printed once a week) has a police blotter/fire log section. When I have occasion to see that paper, I go right to those logs but they always leave you wanting more information. For example, the police blotter will say “Report of deer attack on Steadman Street” or “Youths vandalizing cemetery” and leave it at that. Well, people want to know a little more than just that. Even “Cat up a Tree” might have a good backstory to it.”
Thanks for the post/ping; BUMP; BUMP; Ping. Interesting thread. Thanks to all posters.
Yep, along with the sob stories about the “poor illegal” family. You are right, the football playoffs, St Patrick’s day parade, 4th of July events-always a place for that stuff.
http://www.timescolonist.com/travel/Good+days+journalism+weren+always+good/4026475/story.html
Good old days of journalism weren’t always so good
http://newsafternewspapers.blogspot.com/
Predictions 2011: More digital convergence, AP Clearinghouse, more trailblazing from John Paton’s JRC
http://newspaperdeathwatch.com/
Timesspotting
I’ve been thinking for a while that just about anyone could set up a news wire service that would be a heck of a lot better than AP, with just a password protected website.
Not only could it include subscribers such as interested old media, but a lot of new media as well. It would work by blending facets of other, commercial and non-commercial websites. The articles within would be semi-copyrighted, only for commercial use by members, and non-commercial use by the public.
So no Righthaven b.s.
It would work by having an upload/download ratio for stories. If you want to republish someone else’s news, you have to contribute some of your own news, *that other people want*. If you just post lame stories that nobody wants, you are less able to download other people’s stuff.
Add to that the popularity of stories also boosting the contributors upload ratio, and *editorial reviews* and *criticisms* of articles, as well as feedback and requests for follow-ups.
Technically, all this stuff exists, and could be blended into a site. And amusingly, since only say 1,000 users, worldwide, would use the site, it wouldn’t have even medium demand put on bandwidth.
Members could still pay for stories, if they had nothing to upload, but only modest fees, split between the website and the original article source.
Once set up, the site could solicit contributions from around the world that its members might want to republish. Status on the site is strictly based on popularity of what you upload, and the quality of your content.
Even freelance writers and photographers can contribute, as long as they maintain a good ratio. It would look very good on a resume to be published by some big names.
Sort of like FRee Republic? We already do a lot of that here.
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