The inevitable end of printed media

New York Times Will Go Out of "Print" Sometime in the Future

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At a recent conference, The New York Times‘ publisher and chairman Arthur Sulzberger, Jr., stated that he eventually expects the “Gray Lady” will no longer be a physical newspaper.

“We will stop printing the New York Times sometime in the future, date TBD,” he said to attendees of the International Newsroom Summit.

This type of statement is sure to cause alarmist reactions in some and will strike others as a completely obvious conclusion to the ongoing struggles of traditional media.

As newspaper circulation continues to fall, so do newspaper revenues. All told, losses amount to 27.2% or ad revenue lost year-over-year between 2008 and 2009. More and more consumers are using the web to stay updated about current events; in fact, in a poll earlier this year, only 21.7% of Mashable readers said they got their news from a newspaper.

In other words, the traditional newspaper might be in trouble, but news as a commodity isn’t going anywhere

Sulzberger’s statement acknowledges this fact; we see it as a commitment to finding new, timely, culturally relevant ways to reach readers and profit from gathering and reporting the news.

Nevertheless, it’s taken most news outlets quite a bit of time to come around to the realization that print isn’t the be-all-end-all of journalism. By delaying innovation, many publications have put themselves in financially dire straits while scrambling to catch up with web-friendly revenue models.

This particular newspaper has flirted with various revenue models for online content over the past several years. Readers will be subject to a metered paywall beginning next year.

Sulzberger noted at the conference, “Our pursuit of the pay model is a step in the right direction for us. We believe that serious media organizations must start to collect additional revenue from their readers… information is less and less yearning to be free.”

NYTimes.com had previously toyed with another paywall-type mode, called TimesSelect, around three years ago. The change wasn’t as lucrative as the paper had expected; still, Sulzberger sees the experiment as educational, not necessarily a failure.

“If we discover that we’ve tried something that’s not working, we could change it,” he said.

What do you think of Sulzberger’s statement that the newspaper would cease to exist physically? Let us know in the comments.

Short version: NY Times has come out and said what every forward-thinking human has been thinking since the digital age began. Someday, the NY Times will no longer be a printed newspaper.

I think it's refreshing to hear them come out and embrace the digital age instead of rejecting it like the recording industry and to a lesser extent the film/TV industry. Personally, I hope the transition from physical to digital happens sooner rather than later. From a business perspective, they will save TONS of money on production and distribution, and will instead be able to focus on the content, which will remain identical to its physical counterpart.

As an avid Kindle user, I'm looking forward to the end of printed media, but I know a lot of people who are actively hoping it sticks around as long as possible. Which camp do you fall into?

Jam it back in, in the dark.

I think pretty much everyone accepts that, purely from a resource and common sense perspective, this was inevitable. We live in a society that is increasingly eco-sensitive and the rise of the internet has made most printed media largely redundant. I get that, I understand the push for modernization, I understand this is a wave that won't be stopped.

That said, I hate the kindle. I hate reading books, graphic novels ( :adjusts hipster glasses: ) or magazines on an e-reader. It lacks a certain tactile immediacy that I love. I collect old books. My favourite is a lambskin bound Tennyson book of poetry. Not because its my favourite book, but because of how it feels, the sounds the pages make, and the smell of aging paper. I've been in love with the act of reading since a very young age. I had a teacher notice I was a strong reader when I was a child, and she supplied me with Tolkien, Adams, Wilde and Vonnegut. I associate reading with these tactile sensations you can only get from picking up a book that's older than you are.

I mean, it's no great surprise I don't like the wave of modernity in printed media for the same reason I don't like the modern approach to things like film and social networking. Everything just seems more focused on flash than on substance. Now, is that a fair assessment when it comes to reading materials? No. The content of literature isn't necessarily as tied to the medium that conveys it, the way you can argue other media is, but I still balk at it for the same reasons. Is it fair? No. Purely reactionary on my part. I like books. I like newspapers. But I also, albeit grudgingly, acknowledge the concept of printing mass quantities of newspapers, books or other printed media just doesn't make a lot of sense when the technology to avoid it is there, coupled with a desire to lower our impact on the environment.

So no, I don't like this change over to purely digital media because I miss the tactile sensations attached to reading a book. I'm also uncomfortable with the concept of owning something that is digital, but that's a whole social theory debate for another day. I am, however, convinced going digital with printed media is a sound decision, if not one I enjoy.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

In some aspects, like a newspaper, I would be more receptive to digital media over its paper form, since I don't read the paper that often to justify having a subscription for the whole thing, so for a small fee I could access all the articles I would care to read. Since I do most of my news reading online, I would be inclined towards that sort of system.

In other aspects, I am not completely for the idea that we will see a total conversion away from hard, paper media form, and it will still serve a significant proportion of how we interact with words in the future. Like Deni, I still like the tactile interaction with printed media. For example, I am currently collecting older National Geographic magazines. Although I could simply shell out the $60 for the complete digital archives and leave it at that, I much prefer looking at the physical copies themselves.

Personally, nothing beats books and other printed media for their ability to have total random access. You simply leaf through it to find things you seek for or leave a bookmark for later reading.

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I'm terrible when it comes to newspapers. I don't buy them every week, but honestly, I love them. I even like clipping the little coupons, while I agree if I did have an iPhone or some other hand-held device that I can download coupons onto and show to cashiers for my discount that I would-- I still have this huge thing for ink on paper.

Mind you, I just recently graduated with a degree in printing.

I was expecting this for some time when Los Angeles Times laid off more than half their employees 5 years ago, but it is becoming more and more prevalent that the value of print is declining. My only hope is that the next generation can still enjoy and appreciate books like we do.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

If there's a newspaper around, I will usually pick it up and read it.

Like a lot of you, I can't handle reading for leisure on a screen. I much, much, much prefer holding it in my hand, experiencing it. That sounds so stupid, but it's true.

I see the benefits of the digital readers, and the conversions. It's just not for me, and I am sure I'm not alone. Which leads me to believe that the tangible paper form of any publications will never be completely gone, but publication via paper will be much, much lower.

I was speaking idiomatically.

Originally Posted by Dullenplain

Personally, nothing beats books and other printed media for their ability to have total random access. You simply leaf through it to find things you seek for or leave a bookmark for later reading.

I don't have an e-reader, but I would be shocked if a Kindle or a Nook didn't have ctrl+d or ctrl+f.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

I should add to my initial thoughts that I believe there will always be a place for SOME things to be printed, like coffee table books and anything in that realm. Literature, newspapers, textbooks, and media of that sort are just begging for the digital age and I imagine if they're ever offered in printed form in the future, it'll be a niche thing.

Personally, I've never had that connection to physical books and newspapers the way some do. I do a vast majority of my reading on the subway where typically I'm standing, holding a rail for balance. The ability to read a novel with crystal clear text on an e-ink screen that emits no light, weighs a few ounces, and gives me the ability to turn pages with a single button click is just perfect for my situation. The convenience factor is massive and I feel like as long as I have my Kindle I'll never read another physical novel again. Graphic novels will remain in their printed form until they come up with a better solution on Kindle or until I pick up an iPad, which is an astounding way to read them.

Russ, the Kindle does offer a search function that works very well. My favorite feature, though, is the ability to move the cursor over any word and get the definition of it in an instant.

FELIPE NO

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Literature, newspapers, textbooks, and media of that sort are just begging for the digital age and I imagine if they're ever offered in printed form in the future, it'll be a niche thing.

Textbooks are the one thing I can see having a hard time making this jump. While I do use books.google a bit, generally if I'm going to do any sort of serious reading I head over to the library to pick up a copy. it's also more convenient since I can spread out 3-4 books on my desk and it only costs me the price of the book. With e-readers I'd need to have 3+ e-readers all loaded up with the stuff I want and being sure not to accidentally drop them on the floor since they're so much more fragile than a real book.

I'm cool with things like academic journals going all electric since nobody really reads them cover to cover, and it's a lot more efficient (economically and ecologically) to just print out the handful of pages you want to read.

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

Being someone who going into journalism, seeing newspapers phase themselves out is depressing.

It's going to be a sad day when something either amazing or tragic happens and I won't be able to go to my local general store to go pick up a newspaper to add to my collection. Just so I have that moment in time there physically with me.

Hell, if something I ever write comes out in the near future, I'd want to buy the magazine or newspaper I got printed in and keep it for myself. Just having it available digitally just wouldn't have that same impact.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by RacinReaver

Textbooks are the one thing I can see having a hard time making this jump. While I do use books.google a bit, generally if I'm going to do any sort of serious reading I head over to the library to pick up a copy. it's also more convenient since I can spread out 3-4 books on my desk and it only costs me the price of the book. With e-readers I'd need to have 3+ e-readers all loaded up with the stuff I want and being sure not to accidentally drop them on the floor since they're so much more fragile than a real book.

I'm cool with things like academic journals going all electric since nobody really reads them cover to cover, and it's a lot more efficient (economically and ecologically) to just print out the handful of pages you want to read.

Interestingly enough, there is a school (I forgot which one and can't be arsed to find the article at the moment) that is giving students eBooks on flash drives in place of textbooks. They're doing this in elementary to kind of gear them for a change like this so that they don't have to adapt to change, they can just be ready for it. Its cheaper on the schools because all the school has to do is just format the flash drive at the end of the term and put the new ones on. Plus it allows for updating textbooks to higher editions more efficiently, instead of sticking with an edition that is 5+ years old because its too expensive to update, or the school feels like its a waste to spend a ton of money on a book that'll only last a year.

I think printed text will still exist for books in general, at least while our generation is alive, just because we're used to it and will slowly deny change. However, with the next generation of youths and the fact that they're starting younger and younger with electronic print, we'll start to see more and more print phasing out, I think.

Additional Spam:

Originally Posted by DieSeLFueLeD

I fucking love used books. If all books went digital, especially textbooks, students would go even further into debt or they'd have to risk fines to pirate the latest edition.

I'm curious how a student would go more into debt with eBooks over physical copies, when publishing companies would save money and thus be able to lower pricing on books in electronic form

How ya doing, buddy?

Originally Posted by DieSeLFueLeD

If all books went digital, especially textbooks, students would go even further into debt

How do you figure? Textbook prices are outrageous, and I would have to imagine that ebook versions would be way cheaper. I envision a program where students are given Kindles/iPads with their tuition and then they have to just buy the textbooks they need to load it up with. If anything, having an e-reader might prompt students to buy more suggested texts instead of just the required ones, since they won't break their back lugging them around and they'll probably end up being a much smaller monetary investment.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

One thing we can all agree on: Even in the future of SIMPLY MAJESTIC ROBOTS and a world where all butts poop and everyone can read at a college level, if you buy your textbooks, paper or digital, from the official university source you're just begging to get sodomized. Seriously. Never do it.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

At least in the future they'll be time machines, so those of you who just really like touching paper can travel back to the Age of Print and get your fix.

Additional Spam:
just rubbing disintegrating copies of the OED all over your face

huff that shit

I was speaking idiomatically.

A number of colleges are converting to "ebook campuses" or something of the sort. The problem is, instead of actually buying the book, you're leasing an electronic copy of the book. So maybe you save 25% off of the price of a physical book, but you're only getting it for the length of your semester. For those of us in fields where topics build upon each other this is a nightmare.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

Looks like a lot of you missed it when I brought this up last summer. Since I made that thread last year, Amazon announced that its e-book sales were outpacing its hardcover sales by 1.3x.

I think it's interesting to see how so many people have such a romantic attachment to printed media, and how that is probably the only reason why it last at least through our and the next generation. If it were solely up to the owners of newspapers they'd probably all have their switch to digital planned out by now, since the writing on the wall is that it's a dying mode of news communication.

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Originally Posted by The Dopefish

I think it's interesting to see how so many people have such a romantic attachment to printed media, and how that is probably the only reason why it last at least through our and the next generation.

So you're saying that printed media will only last as long as there is a demand for it. Can't argue with you there.

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If it were solely up to the owners of newspapers they'd probably all have their switch to digital planned out by now, since the writing on the wall is that it's a dying mode of news communication.

I will argue with you here, though. The death knell of the printed newspaper started fifteen years ago easily. If it were up to newspapers alone, there would be walled gardens of information. Forsee micropayments for each article you read. Craigslist, okcupid, and other services would be illegal. Maybe they'd go overboard like the music companies did, and sue people who quoted news without paying royalties.

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

You hear that, world? Dopefish was the first boy to ever think maybe print media will go the way of the dinosaurs.

His idea.

Copyright.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

I know that it is only a matter of time. I think that is really sad though because I love reading from books. I think that when we only use electronics to read we are going to develop terrible eyesight. I find that my eyes hurt when I look at computer screens and I think that this will worsen when I have to do it a lot of time because of lack of printed materials. While it helps the trees it will make me hate to read, which I don't think is very good because I love reading.

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I myself really am not very fussy when it comes to the medium I use to get my information. I have a shit ton of books, but they are mostly things which I found on the cheap while sifting trough used book stores, or books I have bought that I found by chance and really couldn't resist picking up. I mostly get my news online, though I do catch a television news program every now and again. I used to read the paper every day when I lived with my folks, but I've honestly never seen the point since I've gotten access to the net, which happened when I moved out of my folks house.


What I'm curious about is the often mentioned fact that reading on a computer is ecologically more responsible and sustainable than using paper is. Now this is nothing but pure curiosity, as I don't have the least bit of an idea how one would go about making these calculations, but does anyone know how much energy we are actually saving by not printing? And how is it possible to measure the potential re-use of printed material in this equation? Must we then perform the calculation for each different category of printed media (newspapers, books, textbooks, etc.), or is the difference in resource conservation so substantial that it doesn't really matter?

Edit:

Well, I did find an article in the Journal of Industrial Ecology which details the energy consumption of a traditional library system versus that of a digital library system for journal articles. An interesting read, even if it is a bit dated (2003), considering the subject matter. Turns out that riding a bike or taking the bus to get your books and articles is the most significant way to reduce energy waste, moreso than switching from print to a digital medium, but this is hardly a surprise.

This has piqued my curiosity quite a bit, so I'll update with further findings in case anybody is as interested in this as I am.

Here is a link to the Summary of the article, there's a link to dl a PDF a bit lower on the page.

Digital versus Print: Energy Performance in the Selection and Use of Scholarly Journals - Gard - 2008 - Journal of Industrial Ecology - Wiley Online Library

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Dad is a librarian and a poet laureate. He use to talk to Arthur Miller. I grew up in a house filled with books. Instead of taking me to the playground, we use to go hunting at used bookstores for rare editions. We still exchange printed material during Christmas and all the males in our family have the same reaction when getting a book.

We smell them.

Theres something very warm and very relaxing about the smell of an old book. Theres a certain tactile quality to having another physical or sensory input, not just holding something in your hand and feeling the paper stock. You find things like errors that exist in one printing but not the next or how certain ones have improper inking in them. Or autographs or tip-in plates or you-name-it. I have books signed by Zahn, Scott Card, Matheson...

These are not things digital media can replicate. You turn a kindle off - the information evaporates into the ether. I close a book and it still exists.

I don't think printed media is going away. Theres going to be a VERY vocal, very small group of people who aren't going to let it die and its going to become a very profitable niche market. Same for CDs - I absolutely refuse to buy downloadable media for anything aside from maybe the occasional pop tune. But Leonard Bernstein? In a 128 AAC file? Fuck that. Even if they put it out in some lossless format I don't want it; a harddrive crashes. I don't lose a book or a CD. I have collections of things on my shelf that likely won't ever be printed in that format again.

The digital age will lower costs and make stuff enviromentally friendly - but will also drive up secondary market values, prevent people from finding proper editions, make editing exisiting copies to be more PC infinitely easier.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Quote:

...and all the males in our family have the same reaction when getting a book.

We smell them.

Theres something very warm and very relaxing about the smell of an old book.

Glad to know I am not the only one who does this. If you enjoy books and book smell, you should take a trip to Portland, OR some time and visit Powell's. It is a huge new and used bookstore (the biggest, actually), and the smell inside is inside is incredibly old and musty in an awesome, old book kind of way.

I was speaking idiomatically.

I own an ereader and love it for when I travel. Being able to fit more books than you can read on the ereader or the micro sd card (I have a nook) makes me extremely happy. I don't have the space to house all of the books I want, so being able to still have them in some form for me is great.

That said, it isn't the same. As others have said, it's not like holding a book in your hands. I do have a small collection of first editions that are special to me, which is something that just won't happen with a digital copy. I love walking over to my bookshelves and picking up a physical book to read. If I had my way, I would have a library in my house, but that just isn't realistic. My house is small and I have to severely limit what I keep.

Another problem with "owning" digital books is that you never really do. I refused to buy a Kindle because fuck Amazon. I won't be forced into a proprietary format even if they do have cheaper books. They have already proven that they can take a book back whenever they damn well please. With another site I have already run into the problem of not being able to read a book because I didn't have the credit card I bought it with handy.

The statement that ebooks will be cheaper is ignorant. Already the big publishers have banded together to set prices for ebooks. It makes no sense that in some cases the mass market paperback is out for $6-$7, yet the ebook version is over $10. You can shop multiple sites and find discounted offers here and there, but it's much more limited than it used to be.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

Originally Posted by DieSeLFueLeD

I know these are just ::words:: and it might be beyond some people (you, and possibly Sprout) to enjoy craftsmanship, but a book is more than just words on a page.

It's not beyond me, I just personally don't benefit from it or need it to enjoy a novel. Like I said, I do a vast majority of my reading on the subway. Physical books are a pain in the ass compared to my Kindle, especially a hardcover. I mean yes, I know books are not INHERENTLY a pain in the ass, but compared to the Kindle it's night and day reading on the subway.

FELIPE NO

Originally Posted by DieSeLFueLeD

I guess one could call the idea of purchasing a thing once (in this case a book) and the ability to keep it forever "romantic" (especially if you've got a disposable income). I would call it frugality, especially in an age with DRM and the "leasing" of books.

More than that - there is a historical need for printed media. This is not something that can be overemphasized.

Digital media is iffy at best. Movie directors will re-edit scenes or digitally touch-up effects. DRM on books means that after X amount of time, you no longer have that information for your own use. Music people now use digital touch-up techniques to prevent off-pitched sounds.

The great thing about books - and analog as a whole, really - is that they're a measuring stick for their point in time. People are dumb enough to think that Orwell's 1984 is some overarching criticism of all forms of government - but what it is is a criticism from Orwell's time of writing the book. But the digital age allows you to now go in and re-edit that book, make it what the author didn't want. Other times, if the writer is still alive, he can go back in and re-edit the book and make a new edition. Which edition would you want more? The original, the new one by the author or the one that was edited by someone trying to be politically correct or (current) historically factual or whatever?

And which one is more Orwellian? The book 1984 - or the fact that digital print allows this form of Newspeak so easily?

No, the digital age is just bad news as a whole. It has its place as something fun and small like Internet Forums but the idea that important literary works for the future of a literate race are going to survive on it is just plain silly. Its going to become harder to record history because now anyone can join in - theres no accrediting people posting stuff on CNN blogs or Wikipedias, so if 50 really diligent people decide that HEY GHANDI WAS A FAGGOT, they can really make it a tough time for people who are looking for the facts.

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Originally Posted by Midna

The statement that ebooks will be cheaper is ignorant. Already the big publishers have banded together to set prices for ebooks. It makes no sense that in some cases the mass market paperback is out for $6-$7, yet the ebook version is over $10. You can shop multiple sites and find discounted offers here and there, but it's much more limited than it used to be.

Midna, the bigger argument in this case is that it is a much bigger profit in general, for the publishing companies to go totally digital. The paperback mass markets are offering their prices at $6~$9 often times cheaper than their digital counterparts, but that often times is with a grave cost.

To put a point to this, the Los Angeles Times no longer does delivery M-F for free because their subscription sales revenues do not cover them. They still do the weekend deliveries for $1.50 subscription per week. So people are paying LA Times roughly $5~7 a month to get their papers delivered to their doors on the weekdays. THIS IS STILL DIRT CHEAP, though maybe not as cheap as the amount of electricity you use to charge batteries on your iPad or Kindle to go through the same amount of news/information you can searching on the internet/news website. This subscription fee nearly does not cover the amount of cost it takes to run journalist staff (who they had to lay off hundreds in the last decade), have press offices and news rooms running 24/7, pay the electricity bill on the building that houses at 4-story building tall press, not to mention the labor and facility costs on warehousing and distribution. I have not even grazed the printing process/costs yet.

The printing industry made a few good moves to move forward to eco/environment-friendly newspapers such as the water-based ink printed newspapers like USA Today and San Francisco Cronicle. They use water-based inks instead of traditional oil based inks so the overall chemical impact and pollution on the environment can be reduced (oil-based inks are managed by solvents which have harsh chemicals, and need to run on water constantly--therefore, potentially causing more pollutants to be released in BOTH water and air--plus, when the paper gets thrown away and decomposes(hopefully), the inks don't leave harsh chemicals in the soil). The big guns, fortunately, can still run on traditional lithograph print, but like Sprout mentioned in the opening post, a lot of newspaper companies have already shut their doors. In California, close to 150+ local newspaper publishers have already closed their doors, some big ones such as the Fresno Bee.

You cannot simply pick up a newspaper and think it's only the articles that matter. What part of an economic structure it plays, argumentatively, IS an archaic infrastructure that's been in place for the last couple centuries. What I'd like to argue, is that I hope that there will be some connection between the new digital technologies to keep print alive. Because no matter how useful a Kindle/Knook/whatever e-Reader there is, there is no comparable resource of all of these in one small package that arrives at my door on Sunday morning:

• Global News
• Economic Data
• Critical Political Issues
• Weather Forecast
• Places to Eat / check out
• Movie times
• Local News
• Local Events
• Entertainment in the area (that I may not be aware of)
• Obscure and random things to do
• Apartment listings
• Obituaries
• Coupons
• Sales for local Electronic/Grocery stores
• etc., etc., etc...

I can get through a lot of this information in about an hour. No matter how spoon-feeding the eReaders and facebook/twitter updates are, there's no way I can search for all of these in less than an hour and obtain information that I would find useful. The news-updates maybe, but all the extra stuff along the way I find like "where to get the best deals on chicken this week" and "ooh, an Estate Sale this Saturday in up-scale Palos Verdes, maybe I'll find a nice piece of furniture there for cheap"? No, I don't think I can search or Google all those in the same time frame that I can going through the Sunday paper.

Jam it back in, in the dark.