Twenty-First Century Newspaper

Overview

Newspapers in the twenty-first century have changed significantly in response to increased competition from the Internet, television, and other news sources. The industry never fully recovered from the Great Recession (2007–10). The industry also struggled to remain profitable amid widespread adoption of the Internet and increasing popularity of digital media throughout the 2010s and 2020s, as well as through other economic crises, such as the economic downturn triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic of the early 2020s. Experts suggest that traditional print newspapers are undergoing an identity crisis in response to declining readership, reduced staff, and plummeting advertising revenues. Both print and online newspapers have been forced to become flexible and innovative in the ways they present the news and appeal to readers in an increasingly digitalized world. The overall conclusion is that new business models are needed that recognize and respond to life in the twenty-first century.

Technologies introduced in the later years of the twentieth century transformed the newspaper industry, resulting in twenty-first century newspapers that are significantly different from those of any other century. Virtually every newspaper, except for those in extremely small towns, maintains both print and online editions. With some, the online edition varies little, if at all, from print editions. Most online editions have added such features as enhanced graphics, hyperlinks, and searchable archives. By the 2020s, many newspapers had begun offering multimedia features in their online editions. Many online newspaper sites are charging subscription fees and preventing free access through a paywall or limiting access to a maximum number of visits each month. Some newspapers that require subscriptions do not charge if visitors access sites by clicking on hyperlinks in search engines.

Newspapers that still publish print editions have been transformed in response to staff cuts brought on chiefly by declining readership and lost advertising revenues. Between 2006 and 2021, the total number of newspaper employees in the United States plummeted from 365,460 to 104,290. While job losses were particularly sharp in the years after the onset of the global recession in late 2007 and 2008, the news industry continued to lose employees in subsequent years. In 2022 alone, 1,808 jobs were cut in the US news sector. Nearly 2,700 positions were cut in 2023. For print editions of newspapers, advertising revenues dropped from $47.4 billion in 2005 to $16.4 billion in 2014, and by 2023 had fallen even further to $5.3 billion. By that point, digital advertising revenue and online subscriptions had become essential sources of revenue for most newspapers in the US and around the world.

The situation reflects the lingering effects of the Great Recession that began in 2007 as well as subsequent economic shocks, namely the COVID-19 pandemic of the early 2020s and its accompanying economic downturn. Historically, owners had acquired newspapers at prices based on steady-state revenue, but they became unable to meet responsibilities due to a weakened economy. A number of newspapers either closed or were forced to file for bankruptcy in order to restructure and salvage as much as possible (Meyer, 2009). The Tribune Company, owner of the Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times, and the Baltimore Sun went bankrupt in 2007. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer and the Rocky Mountain News were were among the 105 American newspapers that closed their doors in 2009. That same year, Philadelphia Newspapers, L.L.C., the owner of both the Philadelphia Inquirer and the Philadelphia Daily News also declared bankruptcy. Even The New York Times sold off parts of its new building to a Mexican billionaire, and the Christian Science Monitor reestablished itself as an online-only newspaper. Waves of newspaper closures continued in subsequent years, with smaller, local publications particularly affected. Between 2005 and 2021, roughly 2,200 local print newspapers shut down in the US.

Sue Clark-Johnson suggested that, in addition to facing competition from television and online news sites, traditional newspapers must compete for subscribers and advertisers with composite news magazines, such as The Economist and This Week. However, she maintains that that newspapers will continue to provide a unique service, citing a Harvard white paper written by William Powers for the National Review that stated that 80 percent of all news, wherever it is reported, originates with newspapers. Despite well-documented declines in staff and revenue, newspapers still attract readers around the world. While print subscriptions had declined in most countries by the early 2020s, significant percentages of adults around the world remained loyal newspaper readers. For example, in the early 2020s, an estimated 124 million adults in the US, or roughly 60 percent of US adults, read at least one newspaper—either online or in print—every week.

In the mid-2010s, Robert G. Picard identified six major challenges facing newspapers in the United States and other Western nations in the twenty-first century. Newspapers will be forced to continue to deal with mature and saturated markets, declining readerships, the waning public interest in the news, economic ups and downs, digital encroachment from online news sources, and major technological and communication changes. Parker believes these challenges can only be met through the development of new business models. Older models that depended on market power and traditional distributions are no longer adequate in the twenty-first century.

Picard suggests that part of the blame for the current problems lies with the narrowness and shallowness of news coverage in Western newspapers. He contends that twentieth-century newspaper coverage focused on government, financial, and educational institutions, frequently ignoring the fact that readers were more often concerned with social issues and daily lives. Picard argues that twentieth-century journalists were, therefore, forced to depend on established institutions for much of their information. In the twenty-first century, newspapers have become smaller and more flexible and are more open to collaboration and public interaction. Multiple platforms, social media, and blogs have significantly expanded the scope of contemporary newspapers.

Picard predicts that newspapers of the future will be either commercial or non-commercial, but he maintains that only a few successful commercial providers will dominate print, broadcast, and digital media. While local newspapers are expected to survive, the chief sources of news are predicted to be global providers such as the New York Times, CNN, the BBC, the Guardian, the Daily Mail, and Le Monde. Revenue of the future will derive from a range of sources that include readers, advertisers, events, ecommerce, foundations, webhosting, and provision of advertising services.

Applications

New business models have been shown to be effective at increasing flagging newspaper profits. One of the most successful and widespread innovations from new business models has been to charge for online access. For example, in 2011, The New York Times began charging for online access beyond a minimum number of free visits per month. That same year, subscriber revenue surpassed advertising revenue as the paper’s chief revenue source. Within two years, investors were receiving dividends from subscriber revenue. During the fourth quarter of 2022, theThe New York Times reported $667.5 million in revenue, a 12.3 percent increase from a year earlier; subscriptions accounted for $414.1 million of revenue that quarter.

Newspapers have also begun looking to foundations for support on specific issues. For example, the Los Angeles Times received a $1 million grant to boost coverage of immigration and ethnic communication. Kaiser Health News awarded grants to the Miami Herald, the Seattle Times, the Philadelphia Enquirer, the Texas Tribune, and the St. Louis Post-Dispatch to promote health coverage.

Some newspapers have been turning profits by establishing themselves as online-only news sources. The French-based site Mediaport, for instance, is an online-only publication offering editions in French, English, and Spanish. It was established in 2008; within its first year, the newspaper boasted 62,000 subscribers and annual revenue of €6 million. Within five years, Mediaport was recording a €700,000 profit annually, and the company had helped to bring down two French governments (Picard, 2014). In the United States, the Arkansas Times was established as an online weekly alternative newspaper using funds from six hundred paid subscribers who generated $66,000 for operating expenses.

Some experts are suggesting that what is needed is a new William Randolph Hearst, whose newspapers of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries are credited with permanently transforming the print media industry. Others suggest that newspapers are facing crises not only because of increased digital competition and public distrust but also as a result of corporate greed. They argue that newspapers suffered a loss of integrity when they first began to be owned by moguls and large corporations that viewed them solely as profit-making endeavors. Dan Kennedy (2008) argues that moguls have always been interested in the newspaper business, citing such examples as Mortimer Zucker, Philip Anschutz, E.W. Scripps, and Rupert Murdoch.

However, other experts insist that the key to survival for newspapers in the twenty-first century is to bring in new investors with deep pockets that have already demonstrated entrepreneurial success and who are not dependent on advertising revenue. Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, is frequently cited as such an example. Bezos purchased the Washington Post from the Graham family in 2013 for $250 million. Before the sale, the newspaper had slashed its staff from more than 1,000 employees to just over five hundred. Bezos immediately hired one hundred new staff, introduced new technologies, and began offering subscription plans through Amazon’s subscription service. By 2017, the number of full-time employees had climbed to seven hundred. Adopting the slogan “Democracy Dies in Darkness,” Bezos also changed the focus of the newspaper to concentrate on demanding government accountability. The slogan is adapted from a quote by Watergate reporter Bob Woodward about the importance of a free press to the preservation of democracy. The paper remained fairly successful in the aftermath of Bezos's purchase, reporting 63 million unique viewers of the paper's website in July 2022 alone. However, a wave of layoffs at the Washington Post in 2023 raised doubts about the ability of wealthy outsiders to transform newspapers and ensure their long-term viability. Further, an exodus of staff in 2025 due to decisions made by the paper's CEO led to spotlights on Bezos's hands-off approach to the paper, especially as staff wrote him begging for a meeting to discuss the direction of the paper.

In 2013, John Henry, the billionaire owner of the Boston Red Sox baseball team, paid $70 million to purchase the Boston Globe from the New York Times Company, which had paid $1.1 billion for the newspaper in 1993. Henry upped the price for digital access of the newspaper, invested in new buildings, and created a new digital infrastructure that helped the paper adapt to new trends in media and remain viable in subsequent years. The paper, which had 2,200 employees in 2022, reported a record-breaking revenue of $510 million that year. In another model of newspaper ownership, philanthropist Gary Lanfest purchased the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Philadelphia Daily News, and Philly.com, donating them to the Philadelphia Media Network in a move that allowed them to be operated according to a nonprofit business model.

Issues

Since 2007, the Audit Bureau of Circulation has been allowing newspapers to report combined print and online readership when determining circulation. However, these numbers may not always present an accurate portrait of a newspaper’s overall financial health because some experts warn that it takes one hundred online readers to offset the loss of one print reader. Researchers have learned that readers of local newspapers tend to be loyal, depending on them to be credible and representative of local communities. Surveys suggest that 31 percent of readers are more satisfied with print editions, while only 16 percent are more satisfied with online editions. More than half of all readers depend on more than one news source to provide them with information.

In 2009, Chyi, Yang, Lewis, and Zheng surveyed twenty-eight local newspaper websites to determine how their print and online editions differ, finding major differences in the readership that each edition attracts. Some readers prefer print editions, and others read online only. Many are hybrid readers, regularly using both print and online editions. Hybrid readers were found to be generally older and less educated than other readers. Research has shown that around 80 percent of readers accessing local newspaper sites are hybrid readers. Even among a large newspaper such as the Washington Post, 59 percent of local subscribers also access the paper’s online site on any given day. Over a five-day period, access rises to 76 percent. Chyi et al., also found that market structures have become “fuzzy” because of the need to serve three different markets made up of readers looking for information, readers looking for intellectual stimulation, and advertisers pursuing profits. They argue that market fuzziness is a chief cause of the vanishing reader that has created a crisis in the newspaper industry of the twenty-first century.

In the fall of 2017, Tow Center fellows Damian Radcliffe and Christopher Ali released the Tow/Knight Report: Local News in the Digital World: Small Market Newspapers in the Digital Age, but the report received little attention until it was reprinted the following year as a Seybold Report. Based on the data Radcliffe and Ali collected, of the 7,701 newspapers operating in the United States in 2017, 97 percent were identified as small-market newspapers. The majority of weekly newspapers had circulations of less than 30,000, and 301 newspapers had less than 5,000 subscribers, 396 had from 5,001 to 10,000 subscribers, 366 had from 10,001 to 25,000 subscribers, and 139 had from 25,001 to 50,000 subscribers (Radcliffe & Ali, 2017).

Radcliffe and Ali’s work is considered to be significant because of the lack of other substantive research on small-market newspapers. They interviewed fifty-three experts on the newspaper industry from both the academic and publishing worlds, discovering that in the twenty-first century, small-market newspapers are experiencing lower readership declines, less advertising migration to digital media, and less dependence on subscription revenue than large-market newspapers. Still, this has not been enough to reverse the decline and eventual failure of many of these smaller publications throughout the 2010s and 2020s.

Local advertisers are more likely to take out ads in small-market newspapers because they share a customer base. Locals may depend on their newspapers for coupons and for information on specials, promotions, and the opening of new businesses. Studies have consistently found that digital subscribers are more likely to be younger and either urban or suburban. Thus, older and rural readers are among the most loyal consumers of small-market newspapers. Increased competition from large retailers such as Amazon, Wal-Mart, and Target means that local advertisers frequently depend on small-market newspapers to help them serve and maintain customers and assist them in fighting off competition.

Most experts agree that no single business model exists that will serve the interests of all newspapers in the twenty-first century. Like large-market newspapers, small-market newspapers are being forced to diversify and innovate. Small-town newspapers are sometimes managing to survive by publishing only a few days a week or cutting out Sunday editions. Some newspapers have also considered or have already eliminated home delivery.

Terms & Concepts

Great Recession: Considered the most severe economic downturn since the Great Depression, the Great Recession began in December 2007 and officially ended in June 2009. In the US, it led to a 0.3 percent decrease in the gross domestic product and an unemployment rate that peaked at 10 percent. Newspapers have been one of the industries that have never fully recovered ground lost during the recession.

Hybrid Readers: The term refers to newspaper readers who are generally local residents who read both print and online editions of a newspaper. While the print edition may be read from cover to cover, online editions are generally used for searching for specific information or accessing archived material.

Mainstream Media: In the US, experts tend to identify mainstream media as traditional news sources such as major newspapers, ABC, CBS, NBC, and National Public Radio. In a broader sense, the term refers also refers to cable media channels such as CNN and BBC and to newsmagazines such as Time and Newsweek, encompassing well-established sources that purport to engage in objective reporting.

Nonprofit Newspapers: Existing only to serve particular communities, nonprofit newspapers are able to focus on fulfilling their roles rather than on keeping profits up, costs down, and beating their competition. Since they operate under different tax laws, they have lower operating expenses.

Small-Market Newspapers: Defined as newspapers having circulations below fifty thousand, small-market newspapers often serve cities or towns that may have no other newspapers. The only alternate source of news in such places may be regional newspapers and television stations. On the whole, small-market newspapers have demonstrated more staying power than their larger counterparts because of a limited but loyal readership base.

Watergate: On the night of June 17, 1972, operatives hired by the Nixon administration broke into the National Democratic Headquarters at the Watergate Hotel in Washington, DC. With the help of a source known at the time only as “Deep Throat,” Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, two enterprising reporters at the Washington Post pursued the story, discovering a long trail of abuses that included money laundering and obstruction of justice. President Richard Nixon was identified as an unindicted coconspirator. In the midst of impeachment proceedings in the House of Representatives, Nixon resigned from office on August 9, 1974.

Bibliography

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