Lazy Buffalo journalism

[Lt. Dan's Revenge]

That's exactly the point. You would think someone would be able to at least find his whereabouts, whether it's in Buffalo or Texas. ANYWHERE! And if not the national media, then the AP, or ESPN, or someone. This is just strange to me beyond belief

 

The point I was trying to convey by asking that question is that if he is indeed somewhere far outside of the Buffalo area, particularly in another state down south which might be the case, then the lack of any info. cannot and should not be blamed on "Lazy Buffalo Journalism". Also, don't you think this is a big enough story that if Peters was at his in-season home somewhere around Orchard Park several local media outlets would have tracked him down by now for sure? I have to believe he is not in town.

[Lori]

If I may be so bold to ask. Why does a newspaper have to be on paper? It's not that I'm lazy, it's that I have no time. I do not have the time during the day to read an entire newspaper. i get through about half of it at lunchtime, at which point I have already heard all of the news in the paper from other outlets. is it not possible to have a newspaper in a purely online format? Thus feeding our need for 24 hour news while eliminating the massive overhead that comes with a paper?

 

It became clear to me the other day that newspapers as a medium are dead. The Phillies played a thrilling 13 inning game, culminating in a big comeback win. They had been down 7-0 and won 8-7 in 13 innings. it was one of the most exciting games of the year and was the topic of every discussion that morning. I picked up the paper to read the boxscore and found that there was no information about the game in the paper at all. Why? Because the game ended too late for press. For me to get the news out of the physical paper I would have had to read it the FOLLOWING morning. In contrast I was able to fire up the old Interwebs, get to the online edition of the paper and read to my hearts content (minus the boxscore which came later courtesy ESPN.com). The paper missed out on the best sports story of the month, however, the news entity had it covered.

 

I'm not saying the idea is outmoded but I'm saying the delivery method is. The town crier ceased to exist, the Pony Express ceased to exist, telegraphs ceased to exist, and soon newspapers as we know them will cease to exist. not because they don't provide a good service, but because there became another way to do the same job, only faster. I feel bad for all the workers at the paper who lost their jobs and who will lose their jobs, but when's the last time you cried over the out of work switchboard operator while making a phone call? Technology made them unnecessary and while the journaists are still necessary, the paper and ink and all of the people that go into that are not.

The dead-tree version may be on the way out, but you still need people to write the stories that show up on your IPhone/monitor/whatever. Question is, how do you make Web-based advertising pay for the cost of hiring those writers?

 

And if you figure out a good answer, there's a whole bunch of us out here who would thank you kindly for that information ...

[Beerball]

I understand $1,500 isn't much and that is likely an accurate cost estimate, plus the man hours lost by the outlets sending the reporter. But every dollar is counted, and the botton-line question is what is the potential payoff for the newspaper or station?

We're cool, but damn, I am in a foul mood.

 

Must have Scotch...soon.

[The Senator]

What day is it?

[scribo]

If I may be so bold to ask. Why does a newspaper have to be on paper? It's not that I'm lazy, it's that I have no time. I do not have the time during the day to read an entire newspaper. i get through about half of it at lunchtime, at which point I have already heard all of the news in the paper from other outlets. is it not possible to have a newspaper in a purely online format? Thus feeding our need for 24 hour news while eliminating the massive overhead that comes with a paper?

 

It became clear to me the other day that newspapers as a medium are dead. The Phillies played a thrilling 13 inning game, culminating in a big comeback win. They had been down 7-0 and won 8-7 in 13 innings. it was one of the most exciting games of the year and was the topic of every discussion that morning. I picked up the paper to read the boxscore and found that there was no information about the game in the paper at all. Why? Because the game ended too late for press. For me to get the news out of the physical paper I would have had to read it the FOLLOWING morning. In contrast I was able to fire up the old Interwebs, get to the online edition of the paper and read to my hearts content (minus the boxscore which came later courtesy ESPN.com). The paper missed out on the best sports story of the month, however, the news entity had it covered.

 

I'm not saying the idea is outmoded but I'm saying the delivery method is. The town crier ceased to exist, the Pony Express ceased to exist, telegraphs ceased to exist, and soon newspapers as we know them will cease to exist. not because they don't provide a good service, but because there became another way to do the same job, only faster. I feel bad for all the workers at the paper who lost their jobs and who will lose their jobs, but when's the last time you cried over the out of work switchboard operator while making a phone call? Technology made them unnecessary and while the journaists are still necessary, the paper and ink and all of the people that go into that are not.

Going to an online-only format is happening. But it doesn't save money on the whole as advertisers won't spend nearly as much to be attached to online content as they are willing to have their ads in print, simply because printed matter is lasting while Web pages can come and go by the second. What will happen eventually is that newspapers will still have a "publication," but it will be soft, viewable on special readers. This is already happening on a small level on Asia. The readers can be plugged into a computer where they have the day's issue "delivered" via e-mail and picked up on the way out to the door to catch the train. There are bendable readers that can save a few issues at a time and be taken anywhere. But newspapers are dying more so because we as a nation are becoming less willing to read news at all. Whether it's because people are just more pressed for time than evey before or because they are lazy, a huge number of consumers want to watch the news rather than read it. Well, it costs way too much in production costs to get as comprehensive in story telling through video as you can find in print journalism.

 

So if you want more investigative reporting, if you want more in-depth reporting, read about it rather than watch it. That said, NPR does a very nice job with broadcast investigative reporting, but then it is all audio.

[Lori]

A case study to back up scribo's point: Larry Lage, the AP sports writer in Detroit, just did a kick-ass "all-access" feature on Rich Rodriguez and Michigan. Trouble is, it runs out to 14 pages on the Web site I found it on. Who's got time to read the whole thing? Even other editors are wondering what AP was thinking by sending it out. Across the country (and undoubtedly around the world as well), every newspaper redesign comes with a consultant-approved emphasis on shorter, "quick-hitting" stories.

 

Which well and truly sucks for those of us actually willing to make the time to read something longer and more informative.

[Sen. John Blutarsky]

The dead-tree version may be on the way out, but you still need people to write the stories that show up on your IPhone/monitor/whatever. Question is, how do you make Web-based advertising pay for the cost of hiring those writers?

 

And if you figure out a good answer, there's a whole bunch of us out here who would thank you kindly for that information ...

Part of the issue with online ads right now is click through and since advertisers have an option to go with print they will. When that option is removed companies will still want to advertise so rates can go up. As for permanence, most pages have a rotation of advertisers that change per click, there's nothing saying an advertiser can't buy each slot and ALWAYS have their ad on the front page. Advertisers do digital billbopards now even though from a marketing standpoint they are stupid. Why? because when you buy a traditional billboard whatever you put up stays there until they sell the baord again. So if you buy the board for one month and they don't sell it again for 5 your ad is up for 4 motnhs for free. With digital boards your ad is in a rotation so it isn't even up all the time and is taken down at the precise end of your contract, no freebie time. yet, the digital boards cost a bunch more than traditional billboards. It makes no snese. You get less coverage for less time and people pay more. once all the old billboards go digital advertisers wont have a choice and will either play ball or not advertise. Same with papaers, once the paper is gone they'll find a new outlet for their dollars and trust me when I say that every business is trying to figure out how to advertise successfully without newspapers or direct mail because they are expensive. If papers get in there and push their space aggressivly and tie current print contracts into online contracts to FORCE current advertisers to begin to convert over they will have some success. If they leave it as an either or the company will always choose the old proven way and when the odl way is gone they will balk at the cost. If they get used to paying for something the sticker shock won't be there later on. Right now paper sell their web space like a used car. Come get this space, dirt cheap. Rather than saying if you want the prime space in our print ad, you'll buy this too.

 

I guess my question in return would be if a newspaper can't figure out how to drive revenue through it's website how does a company like Google (or the myriad of porno sites in the world) make money at all? Part of the problem here is that papers are so late to the game that it will be hard for them to make entry. Why would a person pay a newspaper for an online classified ad when they can do the same thing on craigslist? What if the paper bought craigslist (or a regional license to it) and put in a fee structure wherein some level of free service is still available but there are higher tiers of pay services. Same for the news. Why not have tiered access? Papers already do this to some extent by requiring you to pay to access old articles. Why not have a setup similar to ESPN.com wherin there is the free site and the pay site that restricts access. Make daily access easy to do and offer people the same subscription discounts you will offer them if they had home delivery and then have a per day rate of whatever you charge for the paper. You can read the basic site every day for free, if you want the good stuff for one day it's .50 and 2.50 on Sundays. If you want a subscription we'll cut you a break on the daily rate but charge you a month at a time. Can you get a taste of the news for free? Yes. Can you go to a store and pick up the paper, read the front page then not buy it. yes. Offer people the ability to have text messages sent to their phones with breaking news or whole articles e-mailed to their blackberries but charge them for that ability, not as a per each because people willl say I don't want that article I don't want to pay .10 for it. If you offer them blanket coverage per month people will sign up for it, link it through specific cell phone companies and as part of the contract have the cell phone company be the default home page on the blackberry browser to drive hits to your page.

 

Point is there are ways to make money by selling things apart from what you have traditionally sold.

 

Check out philly.com Both philly papers are linked there (they are both owned by the same company - an ad agency at that) The site is pretty good IMO though it could be easier to navigate.

[JasoninMT]

Which well and truly sucks for those of us actually willing to make the time to read something longer and more informative.

 

Which is why they should print a synopsis of articles hitting the keys, and make the extended versions available online... They can restrict it to subscribers only...

 

Newspapers are killing themselves to a degree - they put all the news that's fit to print online - often the day before it shows up in papers...

 

With smartphones and laptops, even commuters don't read the paper anymore... they are too busy working on the train.

 

I am as guilty of this as anyone - but the Internet somehow became "free information access"... I can remember when some places tried to charge for information, some still do (ESPN Insider)... but for the most part, any information you want is out there.

 

On this thread topic... what would it cost to pick up the phone and call someone more local to his home in Texas and have them do a drive-by... to see if he's around? they don't have to stake out the place...

 

maybe we should hire a private investigator to check for us... I'm sure some posters here would pay to know... (not me though, I'm willing to wait with the Bills, at least through week 1.)

[Sen. John Blutarsky]

On this thread topic... what would it cost to pick up the phone and call someone more local to his home in Texas and have them do a drive-by... to see if he's around? they don't have to stake out the place...

That's a really good point. God forbid we share a by-line.

[Lori]

I hear you loud and clear, Jason. I think it's absolutely nuts that newspapers give their content away online -- and in most cases, before the print version hits the doorstep -- but I'm not so sure that people will pay for a Web-only subscription. As you say, they've become used to getting it for free, and it'll be damn difficult to stuff that genie back in the bottle.

 

And yeah, Falstaff -- Craigslist dropped a bomb on the old classified-ad model, and the papers were/are slow to catch up. That isn't helping.

[GG]

Nice job taking one sentence from a paragraph and trying to make it seem as if that was the complete thought. The full paragraph reads, "Have you thought that just maybe it isn't journalists who are lazy -- it is the consumers. The consumers who are too lazy to pickup a newspaper or actually take the time to read a story. Rather, the lazy want everything served to them in flashy television pieces. Really, the lazy want to be entertained, these days, not informed. Digesting real information is too boring for the lazy."

 

The vast number of consumers are no longer looking to true outlets of journalism for their "news." They, and if that includes you, so be it, are looking to cable networks that are in the business of entertaining you while feably attempting to sprinkle in some actual journalism on the cheap. That's causing the actual news organization to go broke. So, yes, consumers' laziness is killing journalism.

 

If you think journalism is terrible, try a different source. If the pizza place near your house started serving crap, you'd likely go find another place, not condem the entire pizza industry.

 

I think you should clarify it a bit.

 

People think news just falls out of the sky and journalists in every media pluck it out and deliver it to print, TV or whatever suits their ether. But, true journalism is tedious and boring and takes a lot of resources. For that, print (newspaper) press rooms have the best set up, because traditionally they had the staffs to handle the tedious & boring work. With consumer preferences changing, newspapers are cutting down on the newsroom staff, and for that news is getting dumbed down because TV or the Internets are not set up to provide the same level of news.

 

So, bemoan the loss of newspapers because in the very near term all news will be brought to you by Entertainment Tonight, and you'll have no one to blame but yourselves. For proof, check out the Sarah Palin discussions on the dark side.

[ChasBB]

Does anyone know where Jason Peters hangs out in the off-season?

 

Does he hang out in Fayetteville, Arkansas where he played his college football for the Arkansas Razorbacks or does he hang out in the town he played high school football in (Queen City in Cass County, Texas)?

 

If you look at the radar for Gustav, you'll see that the center of circulation is currently right over Cass County, TX and Queen City, TX is currently under a flood warning as per www.weather.com. If he still has family ties in Queen City, perhaps he is here with family.

[Trader]

The guy has deliberately become a mystery man, so why doesn't at least one of Buffalo's so-called journalists locate him and try to make contact, at the very least track his movements to see if he can actually walk without al limp?

 

What's the big problem? Are WGR, the TV networks or the News and Chronicle so hard up they can't afford to do a little investigative journalism?

 

More likely they're just lazy and prefer to speculate rather than investigate.

 

Maybe because he is in a healthcare facility somewhere?

[Trader]

The guy has deliberately become a mystery man, so why doesn't at least one of Buffalo's so-called journalists locate him and try to make contact, at the very least track his movements to see if he can actually walk without al limp?

 

What's the big problem? Are WGR, the TV networks or the News and Chronicle so hard up they can't afford to do a little investigative journalism?

 

More likely they're just lazy and prefer to speculate rather than investigate.

 

 

Maybe he only has one Marble and he is looking for it?

[shoretalk]

The guy has deliberately become a mystery man, so why doesn't at least one of Buffalo's so-called journalists locate him and try to make contact, at the very least track his movements to see if he can actually walk without al limp?

 

What's the big problem? Are WGR, the TV networks or the News and Chronicle so hard up they can't afford to do a little investigative journalism?

 

More likely they're just lazy and prefer to speculate rather than investigate.

You are so right as I sit here in South Jersey I know that the Philly media would have been on this one immediately ... get someone outside his house; have a microphone at the ready when he goes to the store.

 

If Peters has been locked up in a room since January then there are some really serious problems going on with him (I think that we already know this is the craziest hold out ever ... come on speak up or are you afraid you can't play for any one of a number of reasons).

 

But, in the end ... Buffalo sports media wants us to think they are so good ... well prove it and get this story. Don't just leave phone messages for the agent ... pin him down because we know he exists even if Peters is in la la land.

 

But, in the end I hope the Bills management lets this guy rot! Every time he changes agents he wants a raise ... the Bills went out and gave him a big contract (for the time) and most of us have been taught to honor what extra's we get in life ...

 

So cheer on Walker and let's watch these Bills play because their 'teammate' doesn't care a bit about them so they shouldn't care about him ... let's all just watch him toss away $3.5 million this year and then next year and then the following year ...

[bananathumb]

Maybe he only has one Marble and he is looking for it?

 

 

An elementary school kid could do this job. Says a lot about Hamilton, Roth, Sullivan et al.

[Zona]

Russ Brandon, Oline coach, Player, Trainer, etc.... should have made a trip to where he lives.

 

Hard not to talk to someone if they are standing on your porch.

 

EXACTLY!!!

 

Bottom line is, media may be dying, but the Bills are a 650 million dollar corporation who spends millions in salaries. THEY can afford to send 8-10 people to chase him down and say, "Hey, Jason, What's up? What's with the limp, and what's it going to take?"

 

Silent treatment works on women,sometimes, but eventually you both need to apologize and kiss and make-up. It feels to me like this is what's going on here.

[John Adams]

I hear you loud and clear, Jason. I think it's absolutely nuts that newspapers give their content away online -- and in most cases, before the print version hits the doorstep -- but I'm not so sure that people will pay for a Web-only subscription. As you say, they've become used to getting it for free, and it'll be damn difficult to stuff that genie back in the bottle.

 

And yeah, Falstaff -- Craigslist dropped a bomb on the old classified-ad model, and the papers were/are slow to catch up. That isn't helping.

 

I already pay for the WSJ online. I would pay for the NYTimes if it wasn't free. Maybe the Philly Inquirer too. I wouldn't pay for anything else.

 

I believe people would pay for news online if the delivery method was better. I pay for the WSJ online but I much prefer reading it in paper. (Still, I've made the environmental choice to read it online.) I don't have an answer on better layouts but the NYTimes, to me, has the best website.

[Lori]

An elementary school kid could do this job. Says a lot about Hamilton, Roth, Sullivan et al.

Roth? Home games only. Sal's the only one traveling for the D&C. Sullivan? Don't know if you noticed, but he's been kind of busy with this little Olympics thing lately.

 

My previous point, as has been echoed by others, remains valid: at the same time both of those newspapers are laying people off, they certainly aren't going to fly someone halfway across the country to "stake out" an athlete's house when he's already shown he doesn't want to talk.

 

And damn, how I wish our shop had the budget some of you seem to think their papers do ...

[scribo]

An elementary school kid could do this job. Says a lot about Hamilton, Roth, Sullivan et al.

An elementary school kid could do what job?