by Julia M. Klein
In the late 1980s, I lived on Pittsburgh's Grandview Avenue, with its vista of the city's three rivers and dramatic skyline. But my office window looked out on a more desolate urban landscape: the South Side, where the steel mills had closed and displaced steelworkers lived in tiny homes that hugged the hillside.
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I think of those jobless workers now as I read about the crescendo of buyouts and layoffs in my own profession. Between the accelerating flight of readers and advertisers to the Web and the deepening recession, is the death of ink-on-paper newspapers imminent? Or is it, in Mark Twain's inimitable phrase, greatly exaggerated?
It certainly feels like the end of days. Most commentators are busy preparing their funeral orations. Some worry about the fate of democracy; others insist that journalism's core civic and watchdog functions will survive on the Web. Not much attention has been paid, however, to those whose jobs face extinction.
One day in the mid-1990s, I remember sitting in the office of then-Philadelphia Inquirer editor Maxwell E.P. King, preparing to discuss my future at the paper. Another editor popped in to exult over a lucrative split in the stock of corporate parent Knight Ridder. When he was gone, I turned to Max, the grandson of legendary book editor Maxwell Perkins. "It's a dying profession," I said, with my customary tact. Max looked appalled.
Our leaders, even the most gifted of them, failed us; they refused to see what lay ahead. At best, they were practicing denial. The Internet? Not a threat, they said, but an opportunity; giving away our content online would serve to reinforce our brand, to woo new print readers. Did they truly believe that? Another former editor told me recently that he remembers saying the words and knowing they were lies.
At the end of 2000, after 17 years on staff, I took a buyout from the newspaper. It was a painful decision, but by then the trends were clear, and many of us were bailing out.
I think of those jobless workers now as I read about the crescendo of buyouts and layoffs in my own profession. Between the accelerating flight of readers and advertisers to the Web and the deepening recession, is the death of ink-on-paper newspapers imminent? Or is it, in Mark Twain's inimitable phrase, greatly exaggerated? It certainly feels like the end of days. Most commentators are busy preparing their funeral orations. Some worry about the fate of democracy; others insist that journalism's core civic and watchdog functions will survive on the Web. Not much attention has been paid, however, to those whose jobs face extinction.
One day in the mid-1990s, I remember sitting in the office of then-Philadelphia Inquirer editor Maxwell E.P. King, preparing to discuss my future at the paper. Another editor popped in to exult over a lucrative split in the stock of corporate parent Knight Ridder. When he was gone, I turned to Max, the grandson of legendary book editor Maxwell Perkins. "It's a dying profession," I said, with my customary tact. Max looked appalled.
Our leaders, even the most gifted of them, failed us; they refused to see what lay ahead. At best, they were practicing denial. The Internet? Not a threat, they said, but an opportunity; giving away our content online would serve to reinforce our brand, to woo new print readers. Did they truly believe that? Another former editor told me recently that he remembers saying the words and knowing they were lies.
At the end of 2000, after 17 years on staff, I took a buyout from the newspaper. It was a painful decision, but by then the trends were clear, and many of us were bailing out.
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