UP Ibalon Bicol: Newspaper

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After the banks, housing sector & the auto industry, a bailout of newspapers?

9/22/2009 | Posted by Anonymous | Edit Post

After the costly bailouts of banks, the housing sector, and the auto industry Barack Obama is considering another bail out---this time, the ailing newspaper industry. Without much help given to ordinary people, the president is likely to think of helping the newspapers, the machinery that helped him get elected.

The media have worked doubly hard, at the expense of its credibility to prop up Obama, hence, in part, the bias that lead to the newspapers' dramatic slide in readership. In the last election, tabloids highly favored the Democrats over the Republicans. Is it incidental then that Sen. Ben Cardin, a democrat of Md has introduced a bill to help these cash-strapped newspapers?

”Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.) has introduced S. 673, the so-called "Newspaper Revitalization Act," that would give outlets tax deals if they were to restructure as 501(c)(3) corporations. That bill has so far attracted one cosponsor, Cardin's Maryland colleague Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D).”---- The Hill (09/20/09, O’ Brien, M.)

Many readers have shunned away buying newspapers nowadays, causing a precipitous decline in their revenue. The explosion of fast communication in the internet has displaced most tabloid readers.

Even if Obama thinks that newspapers are "critical to the health of our democracy," he is concerned where reports, particularly in political blogs are going. The bailout of tabloids is part of a string of government controls that recently include the redesigning of the student aid fund and the revamp of healthcare.

Frustrated and tired of the bailouts which preferentially favor interest groups and political allies, the idea of helping out newsprints on the edge of bankruptcy only give credence to more government interference over people’s lives in a way that many think bends to socialism.

Newspapers have been instrumental in Obama’s glossed over persona and his coming into power as president. Now an instrument of slick propaganda, newspapers in democratic societies must be detached and separate from the government. They employ less people and do marginal help to shore up the economy. (Photo Credit: Photoburst) =0=

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Labels: bailout, bankruptcy, Barack Obama, bias, media, Newspaper, Totie Mesia

Masbate newsman killed

6/20/2009 | Posted by Anonymous | Edit Post

To add up to the high number of journalists being killed in the country, another newsman from Masbate was gunned down by two motorcycle-riding men in Barangay Marcella, Uson, Masbate on June 12, 2009.

The victim was Antonio A. Castillo, a 45 year-old reporter of Bigwas, a local weekly newspaper who sustained fatal wounds at the back of his body before he died in Mabate Provincial Hospital. According to a New York-based organization, Castillo counted as the fifth journalist slained this year in the Philippines. The motive of the killing is under investigation. Photo Credit: Sheltercreow) =0=

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Labels: Antonio A. Castillo, bicol, death, journalist, killings, Mabate, Newspaper, Totie Mesia

Warren Buffet decries the dismal future of US newspapers

5/05/2009 | Posted by Anonymous | Edit Post

In last week’s shareholder's meeting of Berskshire Hathaway Inc.,attended by 35,000 people, Warren Buffet, the “Oracle of Omaha” decried the waning of readership of newspapers in America. The rich billionaire-investor together with his business partner 85-year old Charlie Munger spoke of the dismal future of newspapers which had been predicted even before the Newspaper Association of America disclosed the decline newspaper business.

In 2007, total print advertising revenue dropped 9.4% ($42 billion,) a huge fall in revenue since 1950. Newspaper revenue losses continued during the past 16 months of recession as readership contracted 4.6 percent in the April-September 2008. The drop in sales prompted newspapers to reorganize, cut down on jobs and lessen circulation.

Fewer readers are buying newspapers these days. They now depend on alternative sources of news which are available in online, internet, radio, and TV. Many are disappointed by the increasingly partisan stance of US newspapers, raising doubts on the truthfulness and reliability of their contents.

“Some readers instead are shifting to the free versions of newspapers that most publishers post on their Web sites. That trend helped increase the traffic on newspaper Web sites by 10.5 percent during the first three months of the year, according to a Nielsen Online analysis conducted for the Newspaper Association of America.”---- Yahoo News Finance / AP (04/27/09, Liedtke, M)

About 15 to 30% of major newspapers's revenue comes from subscriptions and copies sold at newsstands. The main source of income still comes from advertising, a money source that is now in danger of drying up. (Photo Credit: Maud77; photoburst)

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Labels: business, Charlie Munger, investments, Newspaper, recession, USA, Warren Buffet

UP Ibalon Bicol

After the banks, housing sector & the auto industry, a bailout of newspapers?

Masbate newsman killed

Warren Buffet decries the dismal future of US newspapers

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