I am halfway through a new book, published just a couple of months ago titled The Death and Life of American Journalism, by Robert W. McChesney and John Nichols.
McChesney is a professor in the Department of Communications at the University of Illinois. Nichols is The Nation's Washington correspondent. Both have authored several books.
McChesney and Nichols provide detailed insight into American journalism, past, present and possibilities for the future. As a veteran of that profession for more than four decades, while I am only halfway through the book I can personally attest that their assessments and conclusions are dead accurate.
Anyone who wonders how newspaper got into the mess they're in, and why they likely won't survive, should read it.
As a professional print journalist I am saddened on one hand, but thrilled someone finally called into account the genesis of the decline of newspapers and journalism, which threatens our entire democracy and society.
So far the book is direct, and spares no words in describing the consequences for democracy without prudent, aggressive, quality journalism, all the while it is vanishing before our very eyes. It describes the thousands upon thousands of journalism jobs which have been sacrificed for the bottom line. This has particularly escalated in the past three or four years.
Look around. Where are the investigative journalism efforts that kept a watchful eye on government? Heck, you can't fault the journalists. Those who have survived have their hands full just trying produce enough "copy" to publish a daily newspaper, albeit growing ever smaller both in physical size and number of pages. It's everywhere: Coast to coast, border to border.
I doubt all newspapers will die. Some won't and will continue to make a decent profit. But at what cost?
While newspaper newsrooms have taken the biggest hit, even broadcast news has been hurt. But democracy never relied as much on broadcast journalism as print. Sound bites do not provide the depth of information.
Of course newspapers have evolved in large part into printed sound bites. You rarely, if ever, see stories that provide the depth of information that tell a complete story. Of course there are exceptions such as the NY Times and the Wall Street Journal.
Often they are once source articles, because that's all the reporter has the time and news space for. They don't have the time or news space to do more.
And speaking of space, there was a time when newspapers were happy to publish local, community news ... even school lunch menus. Parents could rely on the local paper to know what's going on in schools, in government, in their communities.
It used to be if you were an out-of-towner you could pick up the local newspaper and get a picture of the local community. No longer.
Is the internet the answer? Maybe. Although as the books points out, the proliferation of internet sites competing for advertising dollars has depressed revenue possibilities to the point they cannot sustain a truly professional, paid journalism staff...at least to the degree newspapers have until the last few years.
At the end of 2009 Smart Money -- an online product of the Wall Street Journal -- put newspapers on a Top 10 List. It was a list of 10 things NOT to buy in 2010. I'm not sure I'd go quite that far, but clearly without a salvation for journalism, so goes democracy.
Hopefully before the the book ends, McChesney and Nichols will suggest a business model for journalism that will be both profitable and provide a truly free and independent press like our Founding Fathers intended in order to preserve democracy.