The New Media - replacing print with digital has changed the way news is delivered

By Pepper Parr

October 7th, 2024

BURLINGTON, ON

First of a week long series on the changes taking place in print media and the challenge keeping the public informed.

This is National newspaper week; an occasion to look at the challenges the news business faces.

That daily newspaper that was read in most households in the evening or the paper that was delivered in the morning before Dad left for work are things of the past.

Once the largest newspaper in western GTA – the Spectator struggles to stay alive.

We no longer have daily newspapers, or weekly newspaper that tell us what is going on in our communities, provinces, the rest of the country or the world.

There are some daily newspaper being published. The Hamilton Spectator comes out six days a week but it is not the powerful local daily it once was.

Except for a small number of daily newspapers that are national in scope – the New York Times, the Washington Post or the Los Angeles Times – include some of the financial press like the Wall Street Journal or the Financial Times and that is what we have. There are exceptions but they are few and far between.

Those publications have reasonably robust advertising bases that fund the operation; everyone else was taken out by services based on the internet.

Craig’s List and Kajiji killed Classified Advertising; a service that drew in millions in revenue with little in the way of editorial expense other than taking down the information and setting it all up under the dozens of classifications. It was a brilliant idea that has been with us for centuries in different forms.

Classified advertising was phenomenally successful

Newspaper revenue from classifieds advertisements decreased continually as internet classifieds grew. Classified advertising at some of the larger newspaper chains dropped by 14% to 20% in 2007, while traffic to classified sites grew by 23%.

This was the beginning of the end for print newspapers. It took an additional decade and a half for the business side of newspapers to realize that they were in serious trouble – by that time it was too late.

In the past year the Toronto Star pulled the plug on their Metroland unit that published close to 50 weekly newspapers in the province.

Soon after Kajiji was created others created versions of online advertising that included photographs – it was classified with colour and all on line.

Without a financial base print was dead – going on line was the answer but it took time for the larger media companies to figure that out.

Newspaper could tell a story – they had sections that reported on business – the Globe and Mail Report on Business being the most successful. Ironic that while very good at reporting news they were not able to see how what they were reporting was going to impact them. They weren’t able to see the fundamental change that was taking place.

An interesting example of the newspaper that saw the change coming and found a way to change their business model.
The Toronto Star and LaPresse, the largest French newspaper in Quebec, formed a joint venture with the Toronto Star to create a digital version of the newspaper and publish as online newspapers.

Going totally digital worked for Montreal’s French language newspaper.

It worked for LaPresse – the Star was never able to convince their readers that online was going to be the way you got your news.

In 2016, a few years after the launch of La Presse+, print was restricted to Saturdays and shortly thereafter, on 31 December 2017, the last newspaper was printed.

Publisher Guy Crevier says the paper will become the world’s first major daily to go completely digital on weekdays as it responds to a permanent shift in advertising spending.

Guy Crevier, publisher of LaPresse, pointed out that the North American newspaper sector had lost 63 per cent of its revenues — or $29 billion — over the past decade. “There is nobody who can survive in an environment like that.

The Toronto Star was losing far too much money – the family trust that held a majority of the voting shares accepted an offer to sell the newspaper.

Nicole MacIntyre – Toronto Star editor

The newspaper was acquired by NordStar Capital on May 26, 2020, after the board of Torstar voted to sell the company to the investment firm for CA$52 million—making Torstar a privately held company.

The two businessmen, Jordan Bitove and Paul Rivett bought the newspaper along with the regional newspapers and the chain of weeklies, found that they didn’t share the same vision for  the Toronto Star.  Bitove bought out Rivett.  In July the Star appointed Nicole MacIntyre as editor.