Newspapers!
They may be going the way of the dodo, for whatever reasons, but they were once one of the columns of daily life (pun intended.)
From their arrival on the doorstep, porch, window box, in the middle of the lawn or wherever the delivery pitch landed them, they came to nearly every house first thing in the morning along with fresh bottles of milk.
Now practically no one delivers milk door to door, and maybe that'll be the case with newspapers in a couple of decades, too. Television news blazed some of the first inroads in the newspapers marketplace, then cable news expanded that frontier.
Now the internet has been putting in the first long-reaching, permanent stakes of their media existence, declaring that this is their civilization. Thanks pioneers of newsprint, but the internet can take it from here.
But the internet cannot replace the portability of newsprint quite as easily yet. The wireless internet age is dawning so that may be another strike against papers and for the net eventually.
But the internet cannot replace the localized community feel of newspapers. This one I think stands, for now. Almost all newspapers have their own websites these days, and that's likely to expand, not subside. And while the internet fosters communities, they are not linked by geography, but defy geographical limitations.
But the internet cannot replace (now this one has to be unique to the newsprint version). It cannot replace the pleasure of unfolding the crisp pages, sitting down with a cup of coffee or tea, and kicking back section by section through a snapshot of the world as of presstime.
The internet can't replace the sweet anticipation kids used to have of opening the funny pages. It cannot replace the fun of reading the cartoons and working the puzzles on the living room carpet until the rug shaped a pattern of itself onto the flesh of our elbows.
It can't replace the slow, careful perusal of everything from how to cook the latest recipes in the home section to what a fine mess the politicians are getting us into this time.
Maybe newspapers won't go away, but they are merely changing form. That's for sure. Instead of the community-minded papers of the past, the papers thriving the most are rags that advertise "masseurs" in the back pages along with other smarmy commercial offerings. Or the good-intentioned, but amateurish efforts of suburban bird cage liners may have a sort of triumph when all is said and done.
But the days of the City Paper are waning. We must enjoy them while they are here, those of us who love them. And hope that they survive in some form with at least some of the integrity they displayed in the past.
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Today's Happy Wed 22 April 2009
Linear Mode
