3 ms·

>Any niche will eventually get filled, even the niche of "actual serious news stories for people who want to read actual serious news". No true - the people ca

by DenisM 16y ago

>Any niche will eventually get filled, even the niche of "actual serious news stories for people who want to read actual serious news". No true - the people capable of filling that niche might find a more profitable job elsewhere leaving this one niche dry. It will play out like this: 1) start a "serious" newspaper 2) realize that you have plenty of people who are not in fact serious but like to think of themselves as "serious" 3) realize that above people like pseudo-serious fluff 4) realize that above people are generating you plenty of money 5) realize that fluff is easier to produce 6) start producing fluff, click-bait headlines etc, but try to retain appearance of serious 7) Slide into being a second-rate publication, but keep riding the reputation wave until it's dead. 8) Rinse, repeat. This path is unavoidable, for anyone who made it to step 2 will follow through the end, or get ousted by profit-seeking shareholders.

anamax 16y ago
Bloomberg and WSJ seem to have avoided 1->2 aor 2->3. Note that public media companies are relatively new, and their biggest problem is Craigslist, which is deliberately not maximizing revenue. (CL isn't public, so it isn't legally obligated to do so and Newmark has control.) Also, the "fact" that incumbents will tend to leave a niche does not imply that new players won't enter. As a result, the niche can stay filled even though the occupants leave.
- DenisM 16y ago
  Yes, it's not impossible to slow down the process. I'm not reading either of the two papers you mentioned, but I used to read another serious paper - Harvard Business Review, and they were producing 50% fluff plus 50% great reading material. I recon that's their deal with the devil, and not a bad one. However I am strongly convinced that it rests solely on integrity of the old-school journalists and once they retire so will the relevant news.

by DenisM 16y ago

anamax 16y ago

Bloomberg and WSJ seem to have avoided 1->2 aor 2->3. Note that public media companies are relatively new, and their biggest problem is Craigslist, which is deliberately not maximizing revenue. (CL isn't public, so it isn't legally obligated to do so and Newmark has control.) Also, the "fact" that incumbents will tend to leave a niche does not imply that new players won't enter. As a result, the niche can stay filled even though the occupants leave.

DenisM 16y ago
Yes, it's not impossible to slow down the process. I'm not reading either of the two papers you mentioned, but I used to read another serious paper - Harvard Business Review, and they were producing 50% fluff plus 50% great reading material. I recon that's their deal with the devil, and not a bad one. However I am strongly convinced that it rests solely on integrity of the old-school journalists and once they retire so will the relevant news.