Some do a lot of internet research, a LOT of internet research. Some do so much internet research that sometimes it becomes difficult to find a past reference article, then happily remember the link has already been encapsulated somewhere in a prior article one wrote and the difficult to find old link can be reaccessed through one's own prior writings.
Tonight I was thwarted 3 times by newspaper paywalls to news sites that used to provide access for "free". Wanting to identify different newspaper related issues that need to be addressed sooner rather than later as the recent crumbling of the LA Times proves, has probably sent some shock waves to other news sites that are tying to financially survive.
First point, COOKIES SUCK. Cookies slow down one's computer and basically defeat their purpose for existing. It's time for the alleged marketing brainiacs to focus on solid ads and FORGET ABOUT studying every move every human makes while on the internet.
Think of the Star Trek Prime Directive for a moment, do not interfere with the everyday life of the species being studied. The same rule should apply to the Internet. You don't know why I am looking up the word "brassica", so, quit trying to figure it out. Why does this matter? If all the cookies were not stuffed down out computer's throats, causing our computers to run deathly slow, people would find it easier to search out what they wanted, without having it shoved in their face via prying nanny cookies watching us 24/7 so reams of data can be used to force feed us what they think we want based on our prior internet travel.
Newsflash, sometimes people do searches to help out a friend or relative with information they might find valuable, rendering nanny cookies following our every move a waste of time.
As for newspapers, they don't need to try and target every readers "visit" with the "right" ad scheme. Newspapers also don't need to trick their readers with 1 dollar for 3 months ads that simply piss off the subscriber, who has no intention of paying 5 dollars a week once the special offer is over but becomes subscription ambushed into a much higher subscription rate because they forgot the low offer trial offer had expired.
According to Pew Research center, Newspaper Advertising peaked in 2006.
2006 49,275,402,572 Billion advertising, 10,548,344,000 Circulation revenue.
2022 9,760,830,024 Billion advertising, 11,606,129,049 Circulation revenue.
In 2022 newspaper advertising revenue had dropped by a factor of 5 times its highest level while Circulation Revenue has remained remarkably stable, so it's not all bad news. The peak advertising dollars I think was also the peak of color printed ads, which had its own production and distribution cost issues contributing to the peak advertising year of 2006.
While I do think there are solutions for stabilizing and improving newspaper income, what is the point when the mainstream media started a massive downward spiral in 2008 with an incredibly ham fisted intervention into the Hillary Clinton / Barack Obama Democrat Nomination race.
The mainstream media's hamfistedness was further hampered when the Obama Administration ended the Moderate think tank around 2013. The mainstream media's remarkably slanted news coverage included a 94% negative reporting of Donald Trump during his first Presidency in 2016, and has continued to this day.
The problem with letting the mainstream media die is, no matter how one sided the news reporting was, the reporters and articles still allow for historically relevant information to be used for research purposes.
My solution for newspaper stability is for each newspaper to start printing two versions of the same story, one slanted towards Progressives, the other towards Conservatives. While ideally the news should provide both viewpoints within the same article, that can make the articles very lengthy and bland to read. Rather, a Solid Progressive viewpoint, a Solid conservative viewpoint, perhaps side by side on the same screen, perhaps a red blue tab button that allows the reader to instantly review either news perspective. This should allow readers to venture out of their Ground Hogs day desire to repetitively always go to the same sided view of the news.
I am an Internet Researching Unicorn with 23 years experience as an unpaid internet researcher. I have never been put in a situation where I was forced to slant my coverage or risk losing my job, nor was I hobnobbing in a work environment where everyone was instructed, acted and had similar viewpoints.
Today, I can read practically any biased news story and immediately see what is being left out. News sources have gone so far left and so far right that the old practice of manipulating a news story with a mismatched headlines that doesn't match the story content has dramatically decreased over the past few years.
I have offered an instant solution above that would create balanced news reporting by offering a red and blue clickable button so each newspaper could cover both perspectives on Politically driven content.
And here is an idea to improve residual advertising income. Just create a text box that allows the reader to type in something they are interested in buying, they are transported to a known and trusted partner site, and if they buy the item, the newspaper gets a 5% residual.
As it stands now, newspapers are beholden to Coders and Marketers who try and match ad content with each reader's interest. The Coders and Marketers have made themselves indispensable at the expense of their client's having readers being bombarded with pop up ads when simply asking the reader to view an ad page they write they would like to visit, would be just as effective, and would cut out the ad people who rely on number of ad image views even when the ad image views slow down the site, are highly repetitive, or are showing products that were already purchased a day or two earlier!
Newspapers should have Amazon dot com, Target, Walmart, Costco, all bidding to be the ad provider for a news site. But there are additional ad revenue streams that I won't reveal at this time but would happily reveal if the newspapers are really serious about preserving their historical relevance, rather than just simply disappearing as if they never existed.
One thing is for sure, forcing the public to pay to read one sided news is like hanging on to a malfunctioning parachute when the emergency cord was there for the picking.
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