The age of the traditional newspaper is rapidly approaching a very real end, though by the looks of mainstream newspaper organizations one would think it were still the 1950s and the height of the paper news industry. With newspaper readership dwindling at alarming rates it would seem prudent for traditional information mediums to heed the warnings of an ever changing global internet world.

New social networking medias leave newspapers on the run

In Sioux Falls, local newspaper response to these changes seems slow to develop. Although the local newspaper website has undergone numerous layout redesigns in the past few years (ad nauseum, in fact), it’s reach appears to focus on young readers who are not traditional “local readership” material. The idea may be to try and capture this never-before reached demographic, but simply providing new technological options on a website without a clearly defined direction for long-term growth and development is not enough to build the type of online loyalty these newspapers will require in the decades to come.  Clearly an “outside the hemisphere” thought process is required to ensure stable readership numbers if local newspapers ever hope to maintain their local community base.

One regional newspaper, however, does seem to be taking on the challenge of thinking outside the box. The Minneapolis Star Tribune has decided recently that it will no longer subscribe to the AP wire service. An organization spokesperson indicated that the Tribune was simply rethinking its business model. Obviously that model no longer includes the inveterate wire service, which has been in existence nearly as long as print newspapers.  According to the AP website, they are “the backbone of the world’s information system”. It is very likely this may change soon but whether these changes are good or bad for a society dependent upon fast, valid information, only time will tell.

An example of the types of challenges that newspapers across the country will face includes the recently launched allvoices.com. This stunning effort takes the Wikipedia concept to the next level with a global newspaper written by the people, for the people. Of course, the founding fathers may be turning in their graves at the thought of local community members creating their own “news” (not to mention a few stolid newspaper editors) but the surge seems clearly something the future may sustain, and even more clearly, something local newspapers will have to address, and soon.

Recently the Chicago Tribune made a valiant effort at merging the “by the people” concepts of local news coverage with the traditional coverage of a paid report. The reporter, coined online as GustavReporter, made use of the newest social networking craze, Twitter. Twitter allows users with accounts to create small, 140 characters or less, messages or “status updates” to other users who are following their feed. According to Twitter, it is a “service for friends, family, and co–workers to communicate and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to one simple question: What are you doing?”

The Tribune used the tool to provide up-to-the-minute reporting of events, weather, and anything related to activities in New Orleans, before and while hurricane Gustav hit the coast, and to monitor other Twitter users on developments in the area. The ground breaking news effort even went so far as to request from other Twitter users a place for one New Orleans resident to harbor his animals after losing air conditioning at his own location. The approach was successful and seemed to be an obvious win for social networking journalism. The rub came, however, when information relating to the evacuation of the homeless cropped up that appeared legitimate but after further investigation, was determined to be a hoax. Obviously one of the challenges of this type of reporting in the future will be how to quickly and efficiently weed out the good material from the bad.

Despite the few ups and downs the reporter seemed to have, the Twitter site follower numbers grew rapidly within a few hours after I began following the reports, and information seemed relevant and informative. As time went on, a web page dedicated to Twitter updates was added the Tribune site, and other reporters were utilizing the information to provide news articles related to, and of significance, to the events of the hurricane and the use of social networking tools online.

So far, I have not seen any other newspapers provide this type of reporting service, but have noticed an increase in the number of political and business users now finding useful ways to provide information and move traffic to their websites through this type of social media network. I am certain, however, that newspapers everywhere will follow suit as quickly as they can, hoping to ride the wave created by the Tribune.

What all these developments indicate is a new era in political and information networking. Whether the appearance of a lack of commitment locally to this new social networking age is the result of corporate foot dragging and slack leadership, or local newspaper’s reluctance to fully and quickly change with the times is likely too early to tell. What is very obvious, however, is that newspapers everywhere will have to react very quickly, and very well, if they hope to ever keep up with this fast-paced, rapidly changing news media world.