Build the Wall Analysis

Summaries of Build the Wall article  

Section 1 (To all of the bystanders reading this…)

I find it quite hard to agree with the author in this section as i feel his points are very bias and he sees only one way to rejuvenate the newspaper industry by making people pay.

Section 2 (Truth is, a halting movement toward...)
It says how the Newspaper industry doomed it self and it is the cause of it's own downfall as little to nothing was reinvested in innovation in comparison to the TV industry

Section 3 (Beyond Mr. Sulzberger and Ms. Weymouth…)
How the Newspaper industry had to make major cutbacks in it's costs, many did this by laying off journalists or allowing to be taken over by a larger firm

Section 4 (For the industry, it is later than it should be…)
Different scenarios for the Post and Times and whether they can survive

Summary of David Simon's overall argument

David Simon wants the Newspaper industry to survive and he has a few theories as to how it would do so. His main argument in the article is for the biggest American newspapers- The NY Times and the Washington post to go behind a paywall and make its audiences pay for content. He's very adamant this will work and sees no other way as to how sufficient revenues will be gained. He suggests that the two Newspapers mentioned above are like market leaders and when they choose to go behind a paywall all other Newspaper companies will follow. Back in the late 90's they though that the Internet would benefit the newspaper industry and were excited about gaining a larger audience in young readers: "The Baltimore Sun were explaining the value of their free Web site in these terms: this is advertising for the newspaper. Young readers will see what we do by “surfing the Web” and finding our site, and they will read some, and then settle down and buy the newspaper." They couldn't have been more wrong about this and the article explains how Newspapers never innovated and just settled for the profits they were getting year after year and missed opportunities to grow their business whilst the Internet and TV took over. An analogy is used to describe the "demise" in the newspaper industry and talks about it being a cancer which started low and has spread throughout, this chilling story is true because Newspaper either have to move on and accept defeat with print news and hope to achieve similar revenue streams to what they were seeing in the 70's and 80's by going online and/or behind a paywall. 

Guardian comment by AC Grayling piece on the state of journalism
 Overall, do you feel the comment piece is positive or negative about the influence of new/digital media on the newspaper industry?

The author does say the Internet has done some good and some bad for blogging and the media. It says the Media has suffered a loss of trust and credibility as anyone can create a news story and share it but this is also a good thing as it has brought on a new age of news reporting as anyone with a suitable device and an Internet connection can report something. It talks about news reporting in the US and the UK and across Europe. The US focuses more on local reporting and are bound by geographical locations because of the enormity of the country whilst the UK tend to take there cue from a more national side of things. This means they have the power to influence politics and famously the Sun newspaper did this by "helping" the conservatives win.

Finally, what is your own opinion? Do you agree that newspapers need to put online content behind a paywall in order for the journalism industry to survive? Would you be willing to pay for news online? 

The two articles sort of take a different approach at it, David Simon's article is very one sided and made me wonder why he didn't make people pay to read it, on the other hand Grayling's piece was much more balanced and raised an issue about journalists needing to control themselves when they come under scrutiny for what they write , as forums and blogs can now question and disagree with a journalists views with the introduction of new and  Digital media. I do disagree with what most of David Simon's article is saying about putting up a paywall, however it is a fact that the Newspaper industry does need to raise finances from somewhere, however putting a price on something which has become so widely available and in an era where internet piracy is rife, News companies may end up loosing customer and finding it hard to increase revenues.