> I hate to be a stick in the mud about this, I mostly belive what
> > you are saying, don't agree ;-), but where does your 80% figure
> > come from and how does it relate to city size?
>
> Although it is documented in quite a few places, the most authoritative
> source on this and related facts is still Ben Bagdikian's "The Media
> Monopoly." It's 20 years old, but updated regularly. Most of the
> predictions he made in 1980 have come true, sadly.
>
> >I checked this site:
> >
> > http://www.newspaperlinks.com/newspaperlist.cfm
> >
> > and was surprised to find out LA has only one daily ( I don't
> > think The Hollywood Reporter is a real paper) but is that
> > balanced by the fact that NY has four? Or does your source count
> > that as one city with one newspaper and one city with more than
> > one newspaper? Because we can go down the list:
>
> That list includes papers that aren't dailies in competition with one
> another, as well as papers with JOAs that make them a single advertising
> entity.
>
> > I'm sure that the farther you go the more one newspaper towns you
> > will find, but that is just consumer reality, not the free market
> > system failing. It shows the free market is working, I would think.
> >
> > How many snowmobile dealers does Miami have?
>
> I'm sorry, but I can't make sense of what you're saying here. The free
> market is working by eliminating competition? Consumers only want one
daily
> paper?
>
> Nick
I thought this would be obvious. I'll need an economist to put what I'm
thinking into real terms but this is the basics:
In any city you will have the population, a percentage of whom are newspaper
readers. Some cities will have a higher percentage of newspaper readers. For
a newspaper to be or stay in business it has to have some minimum number of
readers. (Which daily newspaper in the county has the lowest circulation?)
There are other factors to take into account. Even thought the New York
Times and The Lock Haven Express are both dailies, the LHE rarely has over
18 pages while the NYT normally has 100 (guessing about the number of
pages). The LHE pays it's reporters and other workers much less then NYT
workers and much less for other features. So LHE can have a smaller
circulation then the NYT.
If you boil all of that down, I don't care how important YOU think it is for
a city to have two newspapers, if it isn't profitable then it isn't going to
happen. That's why I think the free market works in this example. Yes there
is a monopoly in some cities but if either the paper price or the ad rates
become too high then another paper could try to start up to bring back
competition. I'd assume the argument that because there is one paper, if
another tries to start, the first can hammer away with low rates and it's
established subscribers but there must be some balance between the prices
they charge and the point where another paper can start.
You can bemoan the loss of competition but it just means that one paper
'won'. If in a small town there are two car dealerships they are either
going to co-exist or some factor, price or service, will make one place
better and more profitable than the other. The two may reach some point
where each still co-exist but there is also the chance that one will go out
of business.
I can't understand your point that it's bad to have one newspaper. How many
people read two papers if they live in a city with two? The customer in the
end decides which paper he supports and eventually which paper survives. Yes
your reasons and points are valid but so what? I can't see a small hardware
store blaming his business failure on the newspaper ad rates when a Lowe's
opens a mile outside of town.
The advertisers don't exist in a vacume. Radio has probably killed more
newspapers than your failure of the free market system and for the longest
time TV was killing radio.
Kevin Tarr
Trump high, lead low
