Trinity Mirror has been accused of “crossing the Rubicon” out of print journalism after its announcement of seven newspaper closures.
The company has announced that the Reading Post is to cease print publication along with GetReading, the Wokingham and Bracknell Times, Surrey Herald, Surrey Times, Woking Informer and Harrow Observer.
Instead it is adopting what it is calling a “bold, digital only approach,” focusing on growing its websites in the Berkshire and West London areas.
The National Union of Journalists has described the announcement as a “watershed momment” for the regional press industry.
Chris Morley, Trinity Mirror NUJ group chapel officer, said: “This is Trinity Mirror appearing to cross the Rubicon out of print.
“This announcement will send shivers down the spine of journalists throughout the group and beyond because we are still nowhere near a position where digital revenue by itself can sustain an infrastructure of quality journalism.”
Ian Proctor, FoC of West London and Bucks, said: “This is a sickening blow for west London editorial employees. It is the second round of redundancies faced by them this year, amid more optimist overtones from Canary Wharf.
“Only this week the Harrow Observer, which can trace its roots back to 1855, was being held up in the council chamber for its coverage of the opposition to local government cuts. Supporters on social media are already mourning the loss of a respected local newspaper.”
Martin Shipton, chair of the Trinity Mirror NUJ group chapel, said: “This is a watershed moment for the regional newspaper industry. Trinity Mirror is shutting down well-established titles and replacing them with an online news presence unattached to newspapers.
“So far there is little evidence that an operation of this kind can generate the revenues needed to sustain a workforce of sufficient size to provide a decent news service.”
Laura Davison, NUJ national organiser, added: “This announcement is a huge shock for everyone affected. Trinity Mirror must have been working on these proposals for some time, but breathed no word, not even when meeting with the government minister on the future of the sector just last week.
“These announcements back up the urgent need for government intervention to stop the loss of distinct, local titles with a job to do in serving their communities and the democratic interest.”
Trinity Mirror’s full statement on the closures can be read here.
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“Only this week the Harrow Observer, which can trace its roots back to 1855, was being held up in the council chamber for its coverage of the opposition to local government cuts.”
So where among the “breaking news, what’s on & sport” on this much-vaunted online newsfeed will there be room for that sort of thing? Never mind the death of newspapers, it’s a nail in the coffin of accountable democracy!
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Crossing the rubicon indeed. Could have been spared the tired cliche, but seriously the industry will look back on this moment as a momentous one for all the wrong reasons, if you love good print journalism.
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Take a long hard look at the print product… it is tired, looking, costly to produce and increasingly irrelevant.
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Yes lensman. Decline was forced though, rather than organic .
papers only became tired because companies ran them down, became irrelevant because vastly reduced and inexperienced staff unable to serve community properly. I am convinced many papers would still be making decent profits but for deliberate decline to make way for the elusive digital crock of gold.
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Ruby Con, newspapers carry old news. That doesn’t stand up among today’s options. I get up to the minute news from a variety of reliable sources on my smartphone. It’s a far better service. Too many papers have useless news editors and poorly-trained journalists because of these cutbacks and because of more able people getting out already. So I’m not missing anything by not buying a paper. If they carried exclusive news, investigations which mattered to the public etc, fair enough, but they are so set in their ways they are given a set number of holes to fill each day and anything goes. Papers are dying, we need to embrace the present and future but someone (not those tired old journos or the boards that claim to lead them) needs to plot a money-making course ahead.
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While the national ‘pops’ – ‘not so pops’ would be more appropriate – drown in a mire of celebrity trash, the once great provincial press is about to expire as a result of sheer bad management.
Once the idea took hold that editorial didn’t matter, it was inevitable that papers would lose not only their status, but also their readers. The implications for local democracy are terrifying, but the ‘suits’ who run newspapers nowadays – admen, accountants and barrow boys – have no knowledge or understanding of such matters. Their priority is the bottom line, short-term dividends for greedy shareholders, nothing more.
And so the magical era of print faces its demise…
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Lots of factors have helped speed up the inevitable decline of print.
How can we expect people to rush out and buy an evening paper printed the day before?
Distribution made a big contribution to the sale and has now been given to the remaining 2 wholesalers who dont much care how local/regional
papers sell.Poor content due to cuts.
No vans,posters or offices in towns has disconnected us with the public.
I can understand that a gradual change to digital is inevitable and probably a good thing for all I know…but the print product has been cut to bits before the digital version has become part of peoples life.
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Swiper. I agree with almost everything you say. But do people go to a website to get the sort of mundane stuff a weekly handles. Cat up tree or another dull planning story does not get the juices going. Which is where a good weekly paper comes in. They get it all at one go. Or they used to.
In any event the bigger stories are on bbc, regional paper, cops websites long before weekly webs (staffing issue) .
I think one thing weeklies need to improve is weekend reporter and photo cover. When I was a young reporter we worked Saturdays and for special occasions such as Remembrance Sunday also on Sundays.
Nowadays communities rarely see a reporter at weekends. Its a modern staff cuts issue, but I feel editors and reporters long ago got a bit lazy and complacent because of lack of competition. They have it now. Web rules OK?
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The move from same day evening news to next morning news just when digital made news even more immediate has been a disaster. Morning papers look thin and stale and their frightening drop in sales reflects that. Most of the decline has been down to deliberate running down policy from goons.
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How long can be before morning or evening papers selling only about 14,000 a day, instead of 100,000 at peak, become twice-weeklies? Or go out of business altogether.
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I’m wondering what these reliable sources are that provide Swiper with his online news, and more specifically how they’re funded. I’m guessing one might be the taxpayer-funded (for how much longer?) BBC; as to the rest, do enlighten us.
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Weeklies seem to depend on press releases from cops and councils a lot.
But these also appear on cops and council web sites, so where is the attraction in seeing them on a newspaper website?
Scoops make hits, but having too few reporters with good contacts and local knowledge limit these severely.
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If there was/is a buzz about websites then, fair play TM, go for it. But there isn’t. They are as tired as the print edition. Just looked at Rugby Advertiser website, a great product back in the day, and one of two outlets of news for people from the town. Top 4 stories are; Care home staff walk on hot coals (general view of the event as the photo), little girl who won modelling crown (picture by her mum after the event it seems), appeal to find missing man from Nottingham, and council press release story on illegal food found by health officers.
Whizz bang wallop! The punters will be frothing at the mouth for that kind of revelatory journalism beamed into their computers.
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Or is it the case that there are too many newspapers available to buy?
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With so few reporters able to give any time to a story, and everything that comes in through press release given a quick read and then the old ctrl-c action, it worries me any story could end up in local papers. Which is why me and a colleague are going to perform an experiment, basically sending out bogus UGC to see how many weeklies and regionals will print it.
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I always laugh bitterly when I hear people shrug off the demise of local newspapers by saying they’ll get their local news “off Facebook and Twitter”. Best of luck wading through that morass of libel, conjecture, semi-literate garbage and thinly-veiled racist smears.
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Idiot newspapers allow their news to be shared onto FB and Twitter, thereby making pointless the print medium. Until they protect their copyright they will continue to go down the toilet!
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Dave Gorman – “Which is why me and a colleague …” certainly looks like UGC.
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As a young journo with only a couple of years in the industry under my belt, here are my humble thoughts on this matter…
I think one of the main issues with newspapers is that we have not changed our business model quickly enough to adapt to the changes brought by new digital technologies. Our model is largely based on advertising revenue but I believe we cannot solely rely on this (in print or online).
For example, one resource which we have as regionals and locals with years of history behind us is the information and knowledge we carry about our areas. It’s easier said than done but we could have turned this information into digital products and services which we could have sold to bring in additional revenue streams.
This article on journalism.co.uk has an example of this (https://www.journalism.co.uk/news/b2b-publishers-had-the-data-but-missed-the-boat-online/s2/a556197/). Although it’s about B2B publishers, I believe it applies to regional and local papers.
I am doing my NTCJ at the moment and whilst I agree with the importance of shorthand, law, public affairs etc, I find it doesn’t prepare me for a digital environment.
From a business point of view, I think media companies need to see news as one key aspect of their entire offering because what we are currently doing is taking the print model, which was largely funding by ads, and trying to replicate it online. That will not work because we are no longer the only ones able to offer advertisers access to multitudes of people.
And I would say as much as poor management etc has led to some self-inflicted wounds on regionals and locals, we as the journalists working in that environment need to adopt a more entrepreneurial mindset and come up with ideas of our own.
Yes, it’s not about the money, but we (not management staff) have to create ways of sustaining our profession otherwise we’ll be back on this site again lamenting the loss of more newspapers and journalists.
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Well said young journos. One issue is that nearly all the older staff who knew the areas well and how to use the wealth of local information have quit.
Those left often do not live in the area, know nothing about it and only know what arrives on e mails. Same often applies to in line managers.
That’s not a good starting point but your discussion is interesting and constructive. Good luck in your career, which will be in digital unless you get out later.
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I regret the demise of print, especially since I am a sub-editor, but at the same time I have to admiit I rarely buy a newspaper and read mostly online, though whether I would continue to do so if I faced a paywall is another matter. The sad fact is there is no future for print newspapers unless they are of the very highest quality and in a niche market..
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