I thought this article from the NYT might be of interst ot many here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/04/07/national/07PAPE.html

It does require free registration with the site, but if any are uncomfortable with that, I have copied it to my account at http://www.idrive.com I would be intereted in the opinions of our current or former 4th estaters.

Mr.(Jay) Harris told executives at Knight Ridder three weeks ago that he was quitting because he would not accept rigid budget targets that he believed made layoffs inevitable. (....) at the annual meeting of the American Society of Newspaper Editors, he said newspapers should not put the interests of investors before those of readers. (Bold face added by me)

Oh, dear Max : have you got a week to spare for this?
wow

Once again, the bottom line.
I wanted to thank for the Bangalore article, by the way--
fascinating.

Once again, the bottom line.

The bottom line does, after all, reflect what people want; it shows what we will pay for. That Mr. Harris's gambit will likely fail only demonstrates again the antagonism with which we greet anything even glancing intellectual.

So you're a supply side economist - eh?[self-yart alert]

What the people will buy and what they want has been proven to be different things a large part of the time by the general public I know - by word of mouth. It's just the patterns of buying and the excellent salespersonship (not the product) that are so engrained into heads not paying attention...

...and, of course, as we see in another recent thread about "they call that art" ...If only I was there first...

"Common" good can come from a lot of different things, but "profit" can't!

(ps. I seem to find more antagonists within intellectuals than within the "Commoner"!)

I worked for Knight-Ridder for 10 years. I'm not at all surprised, but thanks for the outpoint, Max ... fat chance, indeed.

Like Wow says, it either requires a longwinded answer or none. Layoffs among the journalists are "big" news, but newspapers always pare away the other production costs (including skilled printing staff) first. If Mr Harris' comments were literally true, then the carnage among the production staff must have already taken place.

Of course, the other way they do it is to reduce the quality (and therefore the cost) of the staff. This naturally leads to a drop in the quality of the product. Nobody has ever seen this happen, I assume.

Layoffs among the journalists are "big" news, but newspapers always pare away the other production costs (including skilled printing staff)

As when offset printing gradually took over from Hot Type, and then computers came along with spellcheck and we lost proof readers and headline writers, and on and on.
Newspapering is labor intensive. You can't send a machine to a meeting or a fire or to interview a local celebrity.
But then newspapers have always been in the forefront of adaptation to automation starting with broadsheets using movable type to linotypes and now computers.
And, crossing threads, until a machine can absorb the ambiance of a room full of people, and develop a "nose for news" you have to have trained reporters.
And I could spend another week discussing the differences in the training and outlook of reporters today compared to those "in my day!"
Harumph!
wow