Interesting post No More News by former Talking Heads frontman David Byrne on his website about the similarity between what happened in the US music business in the 1980s and what is happening to the news business today.
In a reference to the takeover of The Tribune Company, publisher of the Chicago Tribune, The Baltimore Sun, The Los Angeles Times, TV stations and other regional newspapers, by property billionaire Sam Zell, Byrne notes a number of journalists have left the company and its debts have increased.
He says: "I saw similar things happen in the music business in the early 80’s, as record companies merged and were taken over by other companies (Warner Bros. was absorbed by Time and then later, AOL).
"The result was that the companies suddenly ended up in debt, and, in order to show a profit every quarter, had to forget about their standards and musical instincts. Long-term thinking became a thing of the past. They had to cut back here and there, which often meant cutting out middle-level employees....The thing is, it was the middle-level people who actually knew and essentially ran the businesses."
Substitute "journalists" for "middle-level employees" and you've got what's happening to the regional newspaper industry in the UK. I picked up Byrne's post from journalism.co.uk where it was an editor's pick by John Thompson.
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