A potential new media/old media merger?

Posted by John Burke on March 22, 2006 at 12:50 PM

While many wonder what’s to come of the 12 former Knight-Ridder newspapers that buyer McClatchy is putting up for sale, founder of the Center for Citizen Media Dan Gillmor has an interesting proposition. Noting that one of the potential buyers interested in the San Francisco Bay Area papers, The San Jose Mercury News and the Contra Costa Times, is also a director of Yahoo!, Gillmor suggests that the Internet media company acquire the two papers. Doing so could create a breeding ground for a new kind of journalism.

Yahoo! has showed considerable interest in creating its own original content and although it recently scrapped projects to produce original sitcom style Internet programming, it’s ventures in journalism are rolling right along.

The Merc staff, which obviously wants to save the paper, has started a petition that has been signed by numerous Bay Area community leaders showing that the public values the paper’s service. But despite this public service, the paper, geographically situated in the breeding grounds of the digital future, has struggled gaining readership mainly because of its lagging innovation.

Thus, although he admits it may be a long shot, Gillmor figures that the financial union of traditional and new media in the Bay Area could create the perfect environment to raise the new type of journalism many pundits already see evolving in newsrooms; one where platform is not an issue and multimedia rules.

Source: Bayosphere

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