The newspaper as meat market

Reporters -- no, let me change that, journalists -- love to self-flagellate. Come to think of it, reporters are too busy swilling Jack down at the race track to think too hard about what the hell they're actually doing with their lives.

Witness how much ink papers give to the supposed demise of their own industry. Journalists should be careful: Write it, and it might happen.

But of course there's something visceral and delectable about actually reading a paper: It gets you away from the constant whirring, clicking and droning of modern life. It's portable, but it doesn't matter if you lose it. It's transporting without pixels. (Can paper make a comeback? Story here. More analysis from Jon Friedman here.)

Newspapers that are making it are finding strong niches and playing those hard. To be sure, print will become more parochial, and more news-letter-y, playing to inside knowledge and expanding on ideas bouncing around the coffee shops. Two examples are the Forward and the Exponent, two Jewish papers that continue to flourish on newsprint. (Story here.)

Nut quote:

Has assimilation damaged their franchises? Goldberg calls the issue "exaggerated" - American Jews are simply "becoming something very different." Tobin sees some shrinkage in the Jewish community but notes a countertrend of Jews "interested in being more Jewish."

The supposed decline of reading hasn't hurt much, either. A Forward reading series, Goldberg notes, "was jammed every month. It became a pick-up place."

The newspaper as pick-up place. See, not all is lost!

Hat tip: Romenesko.