Via Reuters:
New York Times Co., McClatchy Co. and Tribune Co. on Thursday posted sharply lower quarterly earnings on high newsprint costs and depressed advertising sales.
The results from the three large publishers underscored the troubles faced by the industry, including circulation declines, high costs and competition for advertising money from the Internet and other new media.
It almost has to be that printing costs have risen—although you’d think the corresponding abundance of bullshit they’ve been able to mine and serve on the cheap would have offset those losses a bit, and attracted a lot of new advertisers.
Because from what I understand, they’ve stumbled onto an unlimited supply of that to dole out, and they are willing to do so with all the alacrity of a Congresscritter pulling home hanks of pork.
So yeah. Ink is the almost certainly the culprit here. Or paper. Rethuglican enviro-terrorists are behind this. Somehow. Mark my words…
****
(h/t Ray Smith)
Ah, some good news.
Related?…
http://www.slower.net//entries/001087.php
I’ve done my bit to cause earinings to drop. I try to stay off their online websites, too. I vaguely remember some scandal brewing in that major paper(s) were accused of padding their circulation stats, which of course, is fraud on the stockholders and those who buy advertising.
The answer is so obvious!!
Full page Ziggy retrospective.
It’s all Bush’s fault. Because he won’t let cheap Canadian pulp into the country.
See? I knew I could spin it onto the correct theme!
Sssh, no one tell beetroot and bruce who’re still busy with their circlejerk over the latest “scandal” several threads below.
It would be interesting to chart Left, Left Leaning, Neutral, Right Leaning, and Right profit earnings over the past six years. Is this a universal trend or backlash toward the Left side. Just curious.
Like a Washington Post, Wash Times comparison? That would be nice.
Quarterly earnings? Three months seems like an awful thin reed on which to rest a case that The People have finally thrown off the chains of the dastardly America-hating MSM conspiracy.
Considering the slide has been ongoing for a while now, you might want to rethink that stance, Josh.
I think we’re talking about the price of ink here, Josh.
tw: high
Here is the chart of their stock price for the last 2 years. I’d say investors think that at least the NYT doesn’t have a rosy future…
Similar results for the Tribune Company (who lost me as a Chicago Tribune subscriber a while ago).
McClatchy Co., held out longer, but has started the slide too.
Considering the slide has been ongoing for a while now, you might want to rethink that stance, Josh.
Was that in the post? Because that’s what I was addressing. More fundamentally, I have yet to see anyone demonstrate any link between declining earnings in the newspaper publishing industry and the awakening of the silent majority to the monstrous machinations of the monolithic Marxist MSM. But if you have evidence demonstrating that Americans are not reading newspapers because they have, at long last, realized the Fundamental Trvth that the MSM is full of commie traitors, and not for other reasons, feel free to cite it.
I’m sure Josh is right. The decline in subscriptions is probably due to some other factor than a recognition that the MSM has become the suck. Most likely the ink costs.
There used to be a time where it was difficult to determine if you were being lied to by the press. That time has passed, for the most part. Great news for us, the consumers. Bad news for the press.
I’m sure the Internet is chiefly to blame. But not only does it make it easier and cheaper to find news, it gives consumers a wider range of viewpoints and analyses, so don’t discount the political aspect of the decline of newspapers. I doubt there’s any way to verify this, but I bet that conservatives were the first to cancel subscriptions to the LAT and NYT and look instead to the ‘net for the news. Also, a great many papers such as my local paper, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, are written about as well as Highlights, and actually less mentally stimulating.
<i>I’m sure Josh is right. The decline in subscriptions is probably due to some other factor than a recognition that the MSM has become the suck. Most likely the ink costs.</i>
Except that’s not what I said. This is the implied argument here:
Premise: Newspaper companies’ earnings are falling.
Conclusion: More and more Americans think the MSM is biased or inaccurate.
Your conclusion could be right; I never said that it wasn’t, contrary to your contention, Defense Guy. But to get there you need to establish an additional premise or three.
Economy booming – papers declining. 2004, papers throw in whole hog with D’s. Circulation drops, revenue begins to dry up. Occam’s Razor might suggest that going shrill and partisan (as well as fraudulent – how many plagarists?) didn’t endear the papers to the 60+ million adults that didn’t buy their passionate advocacy. Also the rise of other news sources, particularly on the net contrinuted.
But it could be the ink. And Craig’s List. And Pinch’s expense account…
We just think that going partisan in a time of alternative sources of information is probably not a business model to follow.
Well…one can only hope.
Same result if the papers had gone screaming righty instead of howling lefty. You can’t deliberately alienate a large chunk of consumers that have an alternative.
Imagine if the NYT, et al were rabidly right-wing. Air America wouldn’t be a tasteless joke then.
Vladimir,
Come on dude, I was trying to eat when I clicked on your link. Now I’m trying to get vomit out of my keyboard, not cool. Also someone ought to let Helen know that the ugly tree called to let her know she shouldn’t worry. It was mistaken when it said she missed the last couple of branches when she fell off, she hit every last branch.
As Tommy Lasorda, masquerading as Gen. Patton, might’ve said, “Never argue with people who shovel shit by the ton.”
Occam’s Razor might suggest that going shrill and partisan (as well as fraudulent – how many plagarists?) didn’t endear the papers to the 60+ million adults that didn’t buy their passionate advocacy.
Judy Miller’s passionate advocacy?
Oh come on, Josh. You name one writer. The overall tone of the paper plus Dowd, Krugman, and the Times Select crew are tilting left. And the reporters know it.
So they have a token representation from the right.
Yeah, Miller is the cause of this reaction, sure she is.
Josh, you’re right. The MSM, iot’s too conservative
It’s too conservative as well.
Big E,
You want something that will make you vomit?
What if Helen Thomas hasn’t hit every branch on the ugly tree? What if there are more branches out there?
It’s a scary thought.
MSM spin:
Check out the rising yields on our dividends!!!
Jay,
Great, I think I just shit my pants in addition to having a near psychotic episode. You better be carefull suggesting something like that. When I read your post I think I saw the fabric of the universe tear a little bit out of the corner of my eye just as I loaded my shorts.
I tell you, a $76 million decrease in one quarter should get some questions asked.
I’m mildly curious as to when they go casters up. Has anyone started a pool yet?
I was pleased to find out they have a stake in about.com and promptly deleted them from my bookmarks. Who says all news is bad?
Frakly, I don’t think bias is responsible for the decline although I’m sure it doesn’t help. I’d bet it’s for the same reason that ratings for night-time news on the major networks has also been declining for years.
My grandma and in-laws, all in their 70s, are the only people I know still relying on print and network media for their news. Nobody else has any real use for any print but their local papers. Hell, my dad’s such a luddite that he doesn’t have an answering machine and even he gets his news from CNN and Fox News.
I thought so, ten monhs ago.
Do you know what their earnings / profitability are like?
South Park has some of the most insightful social commentary one can find in mainstream America. It is unfortunate that their show airs on a network that is willfully part of the problem in regards to Islamofascism. I reccomend Parker and Stone take their show on the road and leave C.C. It is only a matter of time before the web takes over where soon-to-be-outmoded cable television now stands. You guys were innovators on CC…now come over to the web and be innovators on your own.
(Paragraph above also written at my blog.)
Not suprising profitability is down for the NYT. Last year it raised list advertising rates 5%+, yet revenues rose only around 1%.
They can’t sell the crap they’re producing. And yes the bias is hurting them. The NYT has fallen to point it is the number 3 paper in its home market behind the Daily News and NY Post.
TW: I could go on for hours, but I would suggest to anyone interested in the fall of the NYT that they read my friend the Dinocrat.
The Washington Times is part of a private company. Good luck getting a hold of their financial information…but again, the questions is “so what?” Partisanship ensures you cut yourself out of a healthy chunk of market share. The opposite side of the spectrum won’t buy your paper, watch your program, listen to you, etc.
But… but… that Little Pinch Sulzberger clone on Gilmore Girls is so raffishly charming…
What do you think they would be like if they’re one of the few big-city daily newspapers with increasing circulation?
I’ll give you a hint: it’s almost certainly going in a more above-the-horizon direction than that of the WaPo and NYT, both of which are losing circulation.
‘Cause, yanno, you don’t make more money by selling less product.
It could be good. I’m wondering if they’re even in the black, period. Or if they’re just a nutcase subsidized rightwing rag. Depends on the internals, I guess.
A meme not explored adequately, IMHO, is that of the pushback against a hundred years of left-leaning slippery slope that originated in the Buckley/Goldwater era.
The Left has zero perspective on the decline of the republic by way of overreaching government while the Right has little.
Backlash against the left is like pushing water uphill. I’d applaud anything that first dispensed with the silly notion that left and right were co-equal ideologies and dynamics on the only political field of play. That’s just smoke.
It’s because all them kids Booosh left behind can’t read.
Absolutely.
If not yet, the circulation growth argues they’re headed that way.
You … you don’t actually look at WashTimes.com, do you?
I think a big part of the drop of all print media is that the younger generation does not read.
I base this on the “subway” survey. Ride a subway in NYC during evening/morning rush hour and see how few are reading newspapers.
Ride a subway in London or Paris during the same hours and almost everyone is reading a newspaper.
That you are reading a paper does not necessarily make you intelligent (see London/Paris above) just that there are more that do.
In my opinion, the power and glory of the press flowered during Watergate. But in that flowering were the seeds of decline for the mass media.
Watergate led to the branding of reporting and the rise of reporters as celebrities. Before Watergate, there were few print reporters whose names brought instant recognition across the nation. There was Drew Pearson, Jack Anderson, and Walter Winchell, but they were columnists who were conduits for leaks or gossip mongers. The ‘real reporters’ were not famous but they tried their best to report the facts – the dull, boring facts of a story even if there no overall narrative to reveal or political point to be sold.
They press became obsessed with motivation of the government, the politicians and the celebrities. Their reports became stories to be told to the public. The facts only existed if they advanced the story and if they did not get in the way of the feelings of the writers. It was almost like the J schools had been taken over by Lee Strasberg and the Method actors.
This problem became even more pronounced with cable news coverage and the 24 hour news cycle. Reporters and news organizations had more lines to write and hours to fill but the supply of big name guests had not increased proportionally. The government became even larger making it harder to cover more than a thin slice of government. With the introduction of the “gotcha” question, officials learned to keep the press at a distance and to only be interviewed under controlled circumstances. The press had a solution – interview each other!
Why have a guest who may not follow the script when you can get a fellow journalist who can be relied upon for their opinion being in sync with the host and who are will not, or more likely, cannot talk over the intellect of the host.
Impossible you say? Think about it. How many reporters have great accomplishments in the lives that do not involve writing about other people wh o try, and sometimes fail, to make changes that benefit others. How many have built a busines or had to make payroll or build something tangible in the world? Answering mail or writing speeches for the congressman is not hard or dangerous labor.
What we have now is a group of people who are too busy spewing their opinions that they have forgotten not only how to listen but why they should listen.
The more the public sees a live press conference, the more they scream at the reporters on television for asking such dumb questions. When the unsophisticated masses in the fly-over country know the answers, they see the press as a room full of empty heads with pretty hair.
SO, in a free market economy, what happens to a company that no longer has a customer base that believes it is getting its money’s worth? They stop buying the product!
There is hope for the press, it could see a turn-around but it would mean some very fundamental changes in the skill sets of its personnel. But, I don’t expect the press to learn the answer if it is unwilling to ask the question – what are we doing wrong?
Reporters, like doctors, hate criticism. Try emailing your local columnists and you will very quickly find that it’s easy to make them feel stupid. Most of them are already trying as hard as they can and it’s hard for them to feel any worse or less informed.
But reporters and editors aren’t really the problem. The problem is that, regardless of sales or popularity, the management of most newspapers have made the decision to become right-wing propaganda pieces. For example, the NYT’s Judith Miller was the one who pushed the war in iraq. Judy the Retard is probably the best example of how the NYT has a split right/left personality. Meanwhile, Newsday was gutted a couple years back, with most of the journalism replaced by API and “combined wire services.”
The API stories Newsday runs are very carefully chosen to support business and religion, are very narrow, and leave out important details. Like the one where they said car crashes are up since the speed limit was raised to 65. Actually, if you did the math, deaths have gone down per mile travelled. This is just flat-out lying on their part under the cover of “API.”
A two-page spread on intelligent design? You never would have seen that five years ago in Newsday. But they don’t care. They don’t care if they make money or not. Somebody is making them do this, and that person needs to be discovered and jailed.