That sound is the ticking of the Doomsday Clock
The ABJ was sold to an investment company, and I don’t feel so good myself.
Maybe we shouldn’t support local news after all. Not blindly, not as it is and not when so many outlets are owned by hedge funds, investment groups and whatever dead-eyed cult oversees assimilation at Sinclair Broadcast Group. We should be asking whether our continued support actually erodes whatever remains of what we want from local news.
There’s an almost zero percent chance the Akron Beacon Journal improves following its sale to GateHouse Media. That has nothing to do with the journalists there, except that soon there will likely be many fewer of them. After multiple rounds of layoffs, buyouts and cutbacks, those people deserve better. As does Akron, which we may overlook as we empathize with endangered editorial staff.
So, I’m not advocating for boycotts. As I’ve noted before, that only exacerbates the problem. I’m questioning how we support local news. By challenging our most basic assumption about local news — who gets to own it — we can stop the vicious cycles that gave us shrinking newsrooms and corporate contraction in the news industry.
The answer is not to buy more Beacon Journal subscriptions. That will not save jobs, nor will it result in more or better local journalism. GateHouse does not love you. They did not buy the ABJ to build on Jack Knight’s legacy. Making Money is their first priority, and the next two are a tie between As Much As Possible and As Quickly As Possible.
What does the sale of the Beacon Journal mean? It’s a crossroads for Akron. Considering the recent decimation of the Denver Post and others like it, this moment is a crossroads for the industry too.
We can spend most of our time, energy and money on new tech or combating fake news, but the only long-term answer that makes any sense is to create systems and structures that support the kind of local news we want and deserve to have.
That’s why I believe communities should own the media that cover them.
“Owners of newspapers own them for a reason. As a rule, I think they love them.” — John S. Knight, in a 1978 interview with the Beacon Journal
Sorry, Jack. That isn’t the rule anymore, but it could be again.
We’re often made to feel like the layoffs, buyouts and cutbacks are because newspapers are losing money. That isn’t true. When local newsrooms take a hit — positions eliminated, sections cut, responsibilities doubled or tripled for the journalists who are left behind — you suffer because corporate owners don’t think they’re making enough money.
The Akron Beacon Journal could be the poster child for that.
In August 2006, ten weeks after buying the ABJ and touting his love of “local journalism of high quality,” Black Press CEO David Black got rid of a quarter of the newsroom, about 40 journalists. The Columbia Journalism Review reported it was because the paper’s profit margin had fallen from somewhere in the 20 percent range down into the “low double digits.”
If you don’t know, even 10 percent net profit — forget 20+ percent — on a daily product like newspapers is an enormous amount of money. For context, grocery stores get by on razor thin margins that average 2.5 percent.
Imagine a local news outlet that operated that way, one that didn’t have to ship so much profit off to some distant corporate headquarters but could keep that money local, whether funneled right back into the reporting, used for community events or returned as dividends to local shareholders.
That’s the community-owned local news co-op I want to build here. When you buy a share in a co-op (shorthand for cooperative) you get a vote. While the professionals you hire would run the day-to-day, you get a say in the big decisions, like whether to fire 25 percent of your newsroom.
[NOTE: This was originally posted during our beta membership drive for “the Devil’s Advocates”. In Spring 2019, we begin audience research, community conversations and the design phases of the co-op, which we anticipate launching by September 2019. — Chris H.]
The alternative is paying for subscriptions to private equity firms that stripmine local news outlets, removing the “overburden” — those costly journalism-producing humans — so they can excavate the underlying advertising revenue from circulation.
“I’d say I’m concerned about the future of newspapers. I’m concerned about the loss of readership. …the rates are higher, all the time, and the type is smaller, so what you’re doing is that you’re charging the reader more and giving him less. Now is that smart merchandising? I don’t think so. You understand, I’m alone in this.” — John S. Knight, in a 1978 interview with the Beacon Journal.
If it seems crass or self-serving to mention our member drive when the Beacon Journal’s future is uncertain, I’m genuinely sorry. The truth is the two things are absolutely connected. Around this time last year, after the BJ’s most recent forced exodus of talent, I first began to fear the possibility that the daily paper could one day close. That’s when I became serious about changing our business model so we could take on the responsibility of reporting more local news in addition to our coverage of Akron’s arts, community and culture.
There’s one story in John S. Knight’s biography I can’t shake. In 1938, he announced the Beacon Journal would absorb Akron’s other daily paper, the Times-Press. The circulation would increase and they would go from printing six days a week to seven. Then Knight told the newsroom, “We are now solely responsible for printing and distributing information in this city. And that, gentlemen, is sobering.”
There isn’t a bone in my body that wants the Beacon Journal to close. I fear it deeply. When I first heard about the GateHouse sale, I felt ill.
GateHouse is a subsidiary of New Media Investment Group, which is part of Fortress Investment Group LLC, a behemoth that was purchased by Japan’s SoftBank Group for $3.3 billion late last year. They own daily and weekly papers all over Ohio, including the company that prints The Devil Strip. Following the buying spree that includes the Austin-American Statesman and the Palm Beach Post, GateHouse now owns 10 percent of the newspapers in America.
They have “a pretty well-earned reputation for running lean” with a pattern of reducing staff and centralizing functions after an acquisition. Naturally, if good journalism happens, they’ll allow it. They may even applaud it. But no matter how often they say things like “We believe in and are passionate about journalism,” it will never be their top priority and it shows.
Contrast that with the Knight brothers, who took over the Beacon Journal during the Great Depression, following their father’s death in 1933. They had to borrow money just to pay the estate taxes. The paper was deep in debt. The Akron Times-Press was cutting staff, pages and coverage to survive. Jack talked the bank into helping him hire more writers, add new features and expand news coverage. Five years later, they bought the Times-Press.
Our way forward is through our past, one that belongs uniquely to Akron.
In “Knight: A Publisher in the Tumultuous Century,” Charles Whited wrote:
A newspaper had to profit, (Jack) Knight insisted; without profit there was no independence. The newspaper also was a curious combination of elements — a craft, a calling, a business, a production plant.
What the Knights built is bigger than the papers they once owned. They invested in their communities by investing in their newspapers. We can’t expect that from investment groups and hedge funds. There are too few Jack Knights in the world now, so you can’t count on that either.
We can, however, do it ourselves. The Devil’s Advocates are just a start, but the more Akronites who join, the more we’ll be able to produce the local journalism you deserve.
