The Trees Can Breathe Easier

The pulp news sources continue their slide to oblivion. Of 10 pulp dailies, only the Wall Street Journal showed an increase in readership. NYT, LAT and WashPost showed steep declines. The body count. –

• The New York Post lost over 3% daily and more than 8% on Sunday.
• Daily circulation at The Orange County Register plunged 11.9% to 250,724 and Sunday fell 5.3% to 311,982.
• In Los Angeles, the Times lost more than 40,000 daily copies. Daily circulation there was down 5.1% to 773,884. Sunday declined 6.0% to 1,101,981.
• The San Francisco Chronicle reported that daily circulation dropped 4.2% to 370,345, while Sunday dropped 3.0% to 424,603.
• The Boston Globe’s daily circulation fell 8.3% to 350,605. Sunday declined 6.4% to 525,959.
• The Miami Herald reported daily circulation lost more than 11% with 240,223 copies while Sunday dropped 9% to 311,245.
• Daily circulation at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution declined 8.5% to 326,907 while Sunday fell 5.0% to 497,149.
• Daily and Sunday circulation at the Chicago Tribune both dropped 4.4% to 541,663 and 898,703, respectively. In a statement released this morning, the paper noted that it increased its readership with its other products like the free Redeye and its Web site.

The point of all this of course is pulp is dead. But moving pulp content to an online presence is no guarantee either. Both the left and right side of the blogosphere has staked out positions on the net. They have developed skills and processes that far outshine the pulp presence on the net. There is already consideration of a possible fiscal realignment of NYT by outsiders.

So are there opportunties in this demise of the pulp papers? Yes. If NYT died tomorrow for example who would take over syndication feeds? Won’t be www.DrudgeReport.com. He uses a lot of NYT feeds for content. But somebody will. Or what about the local and social news that fills ‘B’ section? These vacuums will be filled somehow.

Linky.