Reading this piece from the Chicago Daily Observer, I just wanted to pick out a couple of points to reinforce my claim that journalism is not to blame for the decline of newspapers. (Yes, I know poorly resourced newspapers tend to produce lousy journalism, but you’re missing the point.)

The Daily News … couldn’t survive the triple whammy of social, economic and demographic change. The sales of afternoon dailies declined with the rise of television and the movement of its readers to the suburbs. By the 1970s, with the decline of heavy industry, there were not as many people commuting to night-shift jobs, long the main readers of afternoon newspapers.

With the continued exodus of the Daily News’ readership to the suburbs, distribution efforts were increasingly dependent on long ribbons of concrete that grew more and more congested, making it ever more difficult to deliver newspaper in a timely manner.

Former News staffer Alan Mutter was quoted:

I would have to say there is nothing — not improved content, holographic pictures or even free dental floss — that could have saved afternoon newspapers from the competing electronic media and modern commuting patterns, work styles and life styles … Times change and people move on. If media companies don’t do so, they will lose. In the case of the [News], we outlived our usefulness and there was nothing to be done.

On his blog, Mutter re-posted this about the paper:

Its readers had moved on. On to the suburbs, where delivery trucks couldn’t reach them with a paper that didn’t come off the press until afternoon. On to the sofa, where they favored Three’s Company on television.

There were no home computers, no Internet, no iPods and no cellphones to get between our readers and us in 1978. Still, circulation dropped. The management was changed. Circulation dropped. We redesigned the paper. Circulation dropped. We tinkered with the product. Circulation dropped.

In the end, there was nothing left to do. Some 300 people lost their jobs, and Chicago lost a great newspaper.

Any more to be said?