If you've read articles about a man named Craig and his free online classifieds, you've probably noticed Craig's smiling face in the accompanying photo. Well, Craig has a lot to smile about. He now has classified sites in almost every major US city and in about 100 cities around the world. Newspaper execs hate this guy. And for good reason. According to a London consulting firm, in its relatively short existence, Craigslist has "destroyed" approximately 75% of US newspaper classified pricing, rates on which just last year newspapers depended on for over 35% of their revenue. Danny Meadows-Klue in the UK's The Guardian writes, "The list is not bad news; it's terrible news. The business model cuts at the heart of newspaper profitability and does so with such elegance, and is so intrinsically orientated to the new economy, that you can't help but shrug and say 'this is the future.'" Well, yeah! Every article written about the San Francisco based .org cites the impossibility of newspapers to compete with such a phenomenon.
If you've read articles about a man named Craig and his free online classifieds, you've probably noticed Craig's smiling face in the accompanying photo. Well, Craig has a lot to smile about. He now has classified sites in almost every major US city and in about 100 cities around the world. Newspaper execs hate this guy. And for good reason. According to a London consulting firm, in its relatively short existence, Craigslist has "destroyed" approximately 75% of US newspaper classified pricing, rates on which just last year newspapers depended on for over 35% of their revenue. Danny Meadows-Klue in the UK's The Guardian writes, "The list is not bad news; it's terrible news. The business model cuts at the heart of newspaper profitability and does so with such elegance, and is so intrinsically orientated to the new economy, that you can't help but shrug and say 'this is the future.'" Well, yeah! Every article written about the San Francisco based .org cites the impossibility of newspapers to compete with such a phenomenon.
We've talked a bit about the bottom line in a couple of recent postings (here and here) and how it's being affected by new technologies and changing reader habits. In June, top newspaper executives at the Newspaper Association of America's (NAA) Future of the Newspaper conference acknowledged the transforming media landscape, heralding the necessity for investment in technology, giving more power to the consumer and innovation in general. But when reading through an account of the meeting in the NAA's magazine Presstime, it doesn't seem like they're sure what to do about it.
We've talked a bit about the bottom line in a couple of recent postings (here and here) and how it's being affected by new technologies and changing reader habits. In June, top newspaper executives at the Newspaper Association of America's (NAA) Future of the Newspaper conference acknowledged the transforming media landscape, heralding the necessity for investment in technology, giving more power to the consumer and innovation in general. But when reading through an account of the meeting in the NAA's magazine Presstime, it doesn't seem like they're sure what to do about it.
We've talked a bit about the bottom line in a couple of recent postings (here and here) and how it's being affected by new technologies and changing reader habits. In June, top newspaper executives at the Newspaper Association of America's (NAA) Future of the Newspaper conference acknowledged the transforming media landscape, heralding the necessity for investment in technology, giving more power to the consumer and innovation in general. But when reading through an account of the meeting in the NAA's magazine Presstime, it doesn't seem like they're sure what to do about it.
