Post Gazette vs Tribune Review

[fleetiebelle]

But the thing is, most people don't want to wait until the next day to find out about news, especially when they can get it online or on television as it happens.

That doesn't mean that there isn't a place in the world for good investigative journalism, but maybe that place isn't newspapers anymore.

[Copanut]

Originally Posted by fleetiebelle

But the thing is, most people don't want to wait until the next day to find out about news, especially when they can get it online or on television as it happens.

That doesn't mean that there isn't a place in the world for good investigative journalism, but maybe that place isn't newspapers anymore.

I keep up with stuff on the internet all the time, particularly with sports and lately with the G-20. But the news you get from the local newspapers is FUNDED by those that purchase the newspaper. The ads pay all the bills and when the circulation decreases, so do the rates that papers can charge advertisers. The on-line Trib and PG will not exist if their brick and mortar papers go under.

Things change, but what we'll have when newspapers go away is a bunch of wannabe reporter types with no real training or background. And how much money will they make if you can get their reports for free?

[Joshbarblahblah]

The duty should not be on customers to keep newspapers alive, but on the media companies to ensure their own survival in a digital world.

I absolutely refuse to spend money on so-called "news" in the morning paper that I read, for free, the night before on that newspapers website. I would be perfectly willing to pay for news if a free, more up-to-date option wasn't available.

Newspapers need to find a way to make a profit. Their death will not be the consumer's fault. It is their fault for clinging to an outdated business model.

Also, investigative journalism has been dying for years - and it's not just because of the Internet!

[aaronibus62]

Hey, how was the old Pittsburgh Press before it went under?
And how about the Sun-Telegraph, which the Post Gazette absorbed when the Hearst family shut it down in the early '60s?

[North Beach Person]

When I lived up there I never liked the Post-Gazette but always got the Press. What irks me now is that when I visit there's no AM paper since the P-G stopped delivering where I go (Brookville).

[greg42]

The Press was the big paper in town, even though 6 days a week it was the evening paper. The P-G was in the morning. The Press was the only one on Sunday via the joint operating agreement. The Teamsters strike just did the Press in, or, well, they (Scripps) gave up on it with the strike, perhaps that is closer to the truth.

It's never been even close to the same since, of course. There were huge spikes in local circulation of USA Today and NYT during the strike as I recall. I was young, and I hadn't even lived here a year, but I was here. The strike was almost a year I think! Several months anyway. Insane. The circulation never all flowed back to the merged P-G/Press, of course. The P-G didn't have the same recognition at all, especially outside the area. I used to snicker at it. For a year or two (maybe more?) underneath the P-G name on the front it said "And the best of the Pittsburgh Press" or something close to that. Then, when they finally decided it was okay to ditch the even the small print Press name from the front page, they instead put "One of America's great newspapers". Yeah, right. If you have to proclaim it yourself, it ain't true!

Honestly, thinking of it again, anyone know why they didn't just call the merged paper the Press instead? Seems like that would have been obvious. Or create a new merged name that incorporated Press, like Press-Gazette? I think they would have been better off. People relate to the familiar around here; you'd think the newspaper folks would understand that!

Since that was about 18 years ago, and I didn't grow up here, I don't remember much about reading the Press. But in those early days of my time here, if I bought a paper, the Press is what I got. Was probably the Sunday that I read most anyway.