Paper Rabbits

This past weekend I was standing in my best friend's kitchen when her mother came through, smacking the Herald Leader down and complaining about one or two of the headlines. It took me a few moments to notice that what she had brought in was, in fact, the newspaper I had been selling months ago at my former job as a cashier at Walgreens.

Significantly smaller, the paper didn't make quite a satisfying smack on the kitchen counter, nor did it bulge with adds for local businesses. It was a simple, flat paper, less than half of its former glory. I noted this to my friend's mother who merely sighed, telling me that since they get the paper every day, she's been able to watch the slow deterioration of something Lexington once prided itself on.

It's become apparent that newspapers are in trouble. With Google, Yahoo, MSN and AOL taking over the news circuit, many people believe that print newspapers are in for a heavy hit. With the massive lay-offs on the Herald, I can see they've already been socked a few good times.

Personally, I like the feel of a newspaper. I like to unfold the sections, search for continued articles, read the comics, the editorials, feel the paper between my fingers. Nothing can replace the feeling of a good, thick newspaper under your arm--as much as institutions like Blogger.com are threatening it. There's something concrete about having a newspaper, something I think the majority of the population is faithful to.

Blogs and online newspapers have a place in American society and news today, but I agree with John Carroll when he says in his article "The Future (we hope) of Journalism": Bloggers see themselves as heirs to the pamphleteers who were prominent in the American Revolution. I think they're right. If Thomas Paine were alive, no doubt he'd be blogging away.

There have always been people out their giving their opinions and their own version of the news, but the institution of most newspapers today is just too strong to be wavered by a force like wordpress and blogger. The new technology that has given us these new forms of journalism is really a great thing, but something I don't think will impact the print papers so drastically that I'll have to log onto my computer to read the news every day.

Quite frankly, I don't think the effort is worth it.
A blog, valuable as it is, is simply not an institution with enough heft to stand up to big government and big business. We need institutions of journalism, muscular institutions, not just individual voices. (John Carroll)