The Shrinking Horde

[Palatine]

He's a story I've told many times but bears repeating.

When Rip Hamilton played in DC, Michael Jordan joined the squad. And the amount of coverage, buzz and folks covering the Wizards went through the roof. The place was a media circus. When Rip was asked about the jump in attention being paid to the team he responded, "It's like being back at UConn."

 

[asteinindc]

gulp...

 

[husky429]

gulp...

The Athletic is far better than any local reporting we've ever had (sorry guys!). This is too bad.

 

[HuskyHawk]

As someone in the business, I will say, it is indeed distressing. A few points to add from my perspective.

1. The actual information around the hoops team hasn't changed all that much. There are other sources for it online. We are not lacking in content or things to read about. and it's not just written copy. Video copy is everywhere. Podcasts are readily available. Weird individual twitter personalities obsessed with UCONN hoops fill our streams. It's a gold mine compared to ten years ago.
2. the absence is in historic knowledge, the capacity to string together some coherent sentences and — most importantly — reliable reporting. Twitter sleuths really can't be trusted as much as beat reporters.
3. We (myself included) can be part of the problem. Lots of sharing of free links to articles with pay walls here! I click them too though i also make it a point of subscribing to a few local outlets even though I'm no longer in CT
4. We could also be part of the solution. There are new models of journalism that have been propped up in certain places: basically non profits where subscription revenue pays the bills, complemented by some ad revenues if they come in. You could imagine a world in which Boneyarders paid a nominal fee for a beat reporter of their own (kidding, that would never happen). More likely: i can imagine a UCONN kid or young reporter out of school starting a substack solely focused on UCONN hoops. If you could convince 600 people to pay $125 a year for that ($10 and change per month), that's $75,000. Not a bad salary for someone right out of college.

As a customer, I think the Newspaper business has been really backward thinking in terms of how they monetize content. A subscription for everything isn't going to work for most non-local people. Occasionally I want to read something in the LA Times, the Courant, KC Star or the WSJ. I'm not going to subscribe. So I can either bypass the paywall or not read it.

A smarter model would charge me $1 for that article. Or even 50 cents. It's a digital world. Learn how to monetize your content. If you don't want Disney+ or MAX you can still rent the movies or buy them. Don't put all your eggs in the subscription basket. For newspapers there would be the added benefit of more clicks for advertisers.

 

[husky429]

As a customer, I think the Newspaper business has been really backward thinking in terms of how they monetize content. A subscription for everything isn't going to work for most non-local people. Occasionally I want to read something in the LA Times, the Courant, KC Star or the WSJ. I'm not going to subscribe. So I can either bypass the paywall or not read it.

A smarter model would charge me $1 for that article. Or even 50 cents. It's a digital world. Learn how to monetize your content. If you don't want Disney+ or MAX you can still rent the movies or buy them. Don't put all your eggs in the subscription basket. For newspapers there would be the added benefit of more clicks for advertisers.

I've always wondered if media companies would be successful lumping together subscriptions for streaming with newspapers. Pay your 15$ for just HBO Max, or 20$ a month and get access to local newspapers.

I don't know the ins and outs of the industry, just something that has crossed my mind.

 

[asteinindc]

Outlets have experimented with the charge per article approach. I'm not sure why it hasn't caught on more. But for some reason the economics have not worked. Maybe the issue is the payment portals/structure?

Bundling publications is something that does actually happen right now. Gannet, for example. Even the NYTs. They own 16 regional papers and The Athletic. The model works, i suppose, if you're a behemoth. But I doubt a mid size paper would enter into some sort of cooperative agreement because, frankly, there really isn't any large scale reader base for some subscription service that gets you 5 different types of regional news.

The hard truth is my industry is pretty screwed. Individualized news offerings with subscription fee service can work. But the number of people employed by that model is, by definition, really small. The trends will continue going downward.

 

[CL82]

Why pay journalists when the boneyard works for free?

Wait, you aren't getting paid to post here?

 

[JohnFSilver]

Yes, the JI had it going real good with their sports section for a while.

But holy lolz, it's unfathomable anyone would every pitch a business plan where a regional newspaper which doesn't even have a Sunday edition would keep 10 reporters/columnists on the payroll just for sports.

Lol. The Ellis family loved sports .

Our motto.

You read NY Times from the front. You read Playboy from the Center and the JI from the back.

We tried to save money one year, I think Chardis didn’t go to Hawaii. When they won that tourney the Ellis’ were ticked that he wasnt there.

Think about it.
You have to go cover a game, then you take box scores and copy, about 60 a night.

Local sports takes a ton of resources. There is no AP to aggregate the info for you.

We had 5 high school writers and editors. And, then 5 people who edited and were UConn writers plus a columnist .

And in cost, the paper had a circulation of 40 thousand when I got there. And in the early 1990s was in the 50,000 range. Internet did ruin everything.

 

[HuskyHawk]

I've always wondered if media companies would be successful lumping together subscriptions for streaming with newspapers. Pay your 15$ for just HBO Max, or 20$ a month and get access to local newspapers.

I don't know the ins and outs of the industry, just something that has crossed my mind.

I don't see it happening. People don't really associate the two. But many local papers are part of a broad consortium. So they could incentivize a subscription by including X number of articles each month from their sister papers elsewhere.

So, if I subscribed to the KC Star, I would get a certain number of articles at the Sacramento Bee, Miami Herald, and the Beaufort Gazette (and other McClatchy papers). Likewise Gannett, Tribune or Digital First Media papers. There's just too much old school thinking in the industry.

 

[auror]

Outlets have experimented with the charge per article approach. I'm not sure why it hasn't caught on more. But for some reason the economics have not worked. Maybe the issue is the payment portals/structure.

Most articles aren't worth $1 to people and it's too much of a hassle to pay $0.12 per article.

 

[uconnyankee]

Hearst Media, which owns the New Haven Register and the Connecticut Post, just purchased the Journal Inquirer of Manchester and as of this week all the UConn men's basketball articles in the JI are the same ones that are in the Register and Post. No more dedicated UConn beat writer from the JI.

Remember 20-30 years ago when there were at least 10 beat writers covering the UConn men's basketball team and they were called The Horde? No more. The only Connecticut newspapers that I'm aware of that now have at least 1 dedicated UConn beat writer are the Hartford Courant, New Haven Register (really Hearst Media), New London Day and the Waterbury Republican-American. I think The Athletic has a beat writer covering the team. Does that reporter specifically cover the team and travel to away games?

The last few seasons only the Courant and Register have sent their beat writers to far away road games like DePaul, Marquette, Creighton, etc. A cost cutting move for sure.

It is a sign of the times as newspapers have shrunk in importance. Game articles are pretty much the same but the more beat writers there were the more extra interesting articles there were outside of the game articles. I miss that. The Horde is no more.

Very typical of the newspaper industry. Lots of consolidation fighting for last vestiges of print revenue and ability to shed costs. Incredibly profitable in short term but nasty business on personal side. As much as papers have tried, digital media makes Pennie’s on the dollar vs print revenue. Google, Facebook and other digital media take 65% of cut.

Only thing to replace. 10% revenue decline every year is cut costs. Burlington Free Press is/was printed in Providence. The logistics of getting paper printed in RI and delivered to VT by 6:00am means early deadlines which kill any sports coverage. Not just the Horde. The entire industry is one step ahead of buggy whips.

 

[August_West]

Hearst has kind of killed the horde. Stamford Advocate, Danbury News-Times and Norwalk Hour all used to have dedicated UConn best writers at some point. All are now under the Hearst umbrella.

Her name is Tania.

 

[August_West]

I did something similar but my routes were the Courant and Hartford Times. Half of the routes overlapped which made collecting easier but reduced my tips. I stopped doing this a few months after getting a grocery store job. It served its purpose for money and most of my friends did it as well.

I also had a car route as an adult for the Courant. It wasn't bad making $1100 a month but a good portion of that went towards gas and auto maintenance and I did claim them as business deductions. At one time that route was over 400 subscribers on Sundays but the paper was so thin during the week that I only had about 260 subscribers early in the week.

The JI and its sports page were a good alternative to the Courant.

Your Delta Tau Chi name is ….. “ paperboy”

 

[JohnFSilver]

Very typical of the newspaper industry. Lots of consolidation fighting for last vestiges of print revenue and ability to shed costs. Incredibly profitable in short term but nasty business on personal side. As much as papers have tried, digital media makes Pennie’s on the dollar vs print revenue. Google, Facebook and other digital media take 65% of cut.

Only thing to replace. 10% revenue decline every year is cut costs. Burlington Free Press is/was printed in Providence. The logistics of getting paper printed in RI and delivered to VT by 6:00am means early deadlines which kill any sports coverage. Not just the Horde. The entire industry is one step ahead of buggy whips.

There is no way to make money anymore off print. Issue is that people won’t pay for content. It’s a never ending cycle of people wanting more and paying less.

 

[August_West]

There is no way to make money anymore off print. Issue is that people won’t pay for content. It’s a never ending cycle of people wanting more and paying less.

Now you know how musicians felt with Napster 23 years ago. They ( writers) are lucky they lasted this long. Music licensing changed, so will writing.

 

[Chin Diesel]

Lol. The Ellis family loved sports .

Our motto.

You read NY Times from the front. You read Playboy from the Center and the JI from the back.

We tried to save money one year, I think Chardis didn’t go to Hawaii. When they won that tourney the Ellis’ were ticked that he wasnt there.

Think about it.
You have to go cover a game, then you take box scores and copy, about 60 a night.

Local sports takes a ton of resources. There is no AP to aggregate the info for you.

We had 5 high school writers and editors. And, then 5 people who edited and were UConn writers plus a columnist .

And in cost, the paper had a circulation of 40 thousand when I got there. And in the early 1990s was in the 50,000 range. Internet did ruin everything.

So true. I always read JI from the back. And always read it before I started my route.

 

[The Viking]

I interned at the JI sports dept while at UConn then worked there for 1-2 years. Great group of guys who were great at their craft. I thought the JI was neck and neck with the Courant as a sports section. Smith, Chardis and Sherman Cain were all great to work with.

Also Phil Sweetland who covered the whale but left for Nashville to cover the new Predators team when the whale left town. Of course Phil also wanted to go to Nashville to play music. I believe he had a bunch of gigs in the CT area on the side.

 

[uconnyankee]

There is no way to make money anymore off print. Issue is that people won’t pay for content. It’s a never ending cycle of people wanting more and paying less.

Print is incredibly profitable. It’s the circulation #’s that make it unsustainable. The only people paying for newspapers grew up on the habit of getting a paper as part of their morning routine. Average age of subscriber is 70+ years old. Probably closer to 75 now

 

[Chin Diesel]

Print is incredibly profitable. It’s the circulation #’s that make it unsustainable. The only people paying for newspapers grew up on the habit of getting a paper as part of their morning routine. Average age of subscriber is 70+ years old. Probably closer to 75 now

????

Print is profitable but no one buys it???

Welp, that means it isn’t profitable.

At the end of the day (or beginning for a morning paper) you need a consumer willing to consume a product. And newspapers aren't it for news consumers.

Otherwise it's not a business.

Newspaper board rooms were filled with newspeople for too long who were too attached to delivering "news" to consumers 12 hours after the entire world already consumed it via mobile devices, TV or other medium.

Print as a news medium is done for ever.

You can do features, interviews or other human interest stories but print for news is dead.

 

[JohnFSilver]

????

Print is profitable but no one buys it???

Welp, that means it isn’t profitable.

At the end of the day (or beginning for a morning paper) you need a consumer willing to consume a product. And newspapers aren't it for news consumers.

Otherwise it's not a business.

Newspaper board rooms were filled with newspeople for too long who were too attached to delivering "news" to consumers 12 hours after the entire world already consumed it via mobile devices, TV or other medium.

Print as a news medium is done for ever.

You can do features, interviews or other human interest stories but print for news is dead print

Print isn’t profitable anymore. When there was a high paid circulation, combined with advertising dollars print was an absolute minting factory.

Now? News has become a commodity.

Think about The Boneyard.

You see an article that I wrote, you discuss it here. I get a link. No one here bought or paid for the link, no one looked at the advertising.

So. How do I make money? It isn’t the news anymore, it is a Facebook, google and other aggregation services.

The people who make money off the news aren’t the people who reported originally. It is the aggregation shops that take 5 news sources, chop it up, amplify it in social and push, and make money on the volume of the content they are repurposing.

Being an original reporter doesn’t pay anymore.

One of my jobs at Espn was resurfacing our original content and trying to fight with bleacher, barstool etc.

ESPN has so much content, bleacher report would amplify Espn content (and make money off it) better than espn did. They would beat us to market on our own stories.

That’s why Espn has actually gotten away from original reporting outside of tweets

 

[Blades]

Print isn’t profitable anymore. When there was a high paid circulation, combined with advertising dollars print was an absolute minting factory.
You see an article that I wrote, you discuss it here. I get a link. No one here bought or paid for the link, no one looked at the advertising.
So. How do I make money? It isn’t the news anymore, it is a Facebook, google and other aggregation services.
One of my jobs at Espn was resurfacing our original content and trying to fight with bleacher, barstool etc.

John I saw and read you fighting the good fight, but pretty much print became the dinosaur because it didn't evolve and really couldn't, as you know to well in a digital world. I saw it coming in the early 2000's when I owned a niche record store and music venue. How many music stores are left because of digital content? I was lucky enough to sell my entire company and venue at the real estate peak.

Funny thing is one of my employees, bounced from the Hartford Advocate where I hooked her up with my sales rep as a writer, then to the JI, then finally ended up with her own company doing digital news and some TV stuff. Here ex boyfriend who worked for me as a manager has been steady with ESPi'N.com for over a decade. While his wife who had the better job in Bristol was let go a few years back. Most important skill in media now seems like be ready for change, because it's coming ....or stay and go broke !

 

[HCCForever]

The Athletic is far better than any local reporting we've ever had (sorry guys!). This is too bad.

The National though short lived in the early 90’s was pretty good as well. It had some local reporting and was reasonable and available in news boxes all over Hartford.

 

[Waquoit]

The National though short lived in the early 90’s was pretty good as well. It had some local reporting and was reasonable and available in news boxes all over Hartford.

I loved The National but it cost a buck when other papers only cost a quarter. First paper with regular pro wrestling coverage.

 

[HCCForever]

I loved The National but it cost a buck when other papers only cost a quarter. First paper with regular pro wrestling coverage.

I remember switching to The National from The Courant when the Courant raised their rates from a quarter to 50 cents. They covered the Dream Season and I wish I still had some of the issues from that season. Good paper but non-sustainable.

 

[JohnFSilver]

John I saw and read you fighting the good fight, but pretty much print became the dinosaur because it didn't evolve and really couldn't, as you know to well in a digital world. I saw it coming in the early 2000's when I owned a niche record store and music venue. How many music stores are left because of digital content? I was lucky enough to sell my entire company and venue at the real estate peak.

Funny thing is one of my employees, bounced from the Hartford Advocate where I hooked her up with my sales rep as a writer, then to the JI, then finally ended up with her own company doing digital news and some TV stuff. Here ex boyfriend who worked for me as a manager has been steady with ESPi'N.com for over a decade. While his wife who had the better job in Bristol was let go a few years back. Most important skill in media now seems like be ready for change, because it's coming ....or stay and go broke !

Hah. I got out of print 2015 and media entirely in 2018 (bitter after ESPN exit).

So, in a Corp coms job these And loving it. Just don’t actually like having a boss. And you are 100% right on what happened. I think news is dead as a profitable enterprise.