It's the End of the News Hole as We Know It

We've now "observed" two future of news media via Twitter (the City Club and ONA events) and watched the Seattle City Council and "No News Is Bad News" events go down via their live stream (while eyeing the #nnbn Twitter channel). One caveat before we recap: what we've learned is mostly useless in practical terms.

• The monopolistic, "big city" print newspaper platform is drowning under its own overhead. It's sinking much faster in a down economy, but was mortally wounded by the loss of classifieds revenue. KEY: Newspaper management has done nothing in the last ten years to improve on Craigslist.
• Hyperlocal news sites (West Seattle Blog, Capitol Hill Seattle, CD News, MyBallard, Rainier Valley Post) are springing up that offer a stronger connection to place and to the people (advertisers and customers) who live there. Also, there are niche blogs (TechFlash, Publicola, Furious Seasons). Note that in most cases, these are founded/run by media professionals. KEY: Self-publishing content delivery technology has outstripped ad creation and delivery technology--margins are thin.
• Journalists, by and large, are not entrepreneurs. They like their old job at the newspaper. When they talk about finding a "solution," they mean they want someone to pay them to produce a newspaper. KEY: Journalists are people, too. Also, they can fill several hours with reasons why it's not fair that things are changing.
• Everyone is looking for a magic bullet: micro-payments, a billionaire investor, non-profit status, public ownership. There is no magic bullet. The print business model does not port seamlessly to the online world. KEY: Journalism has to go through a reboot phase where a digital platform becomes primary and its print presence secondary.
• People content with years of devolution have little patience for this kind of evolution. The P-I's Joel Connelly rudely interrupted West Seattle Blog's Patrick Sand last night, the man from the news organization losing $14 million per year accusing the man from the money-making, hyperlocal blog of "platitudes." KEY: Picture a huge dinosaur.
• At every event there's a wringing of hands over "what will be lost"--ethics, professionalism, accuracy, truth, long-form writing, critical thought, and of course what about poor people, though they (as always) only come up in the latter part of the evening. At every event people get up to say that internet is magic, it loves news, we will all participate as newsies in this glorious new dawn. KEY: It's hard to get independent online journalists to attend these events because they are busy reporting and their day doesn't end at 5 p.m.