Growing up in a newspaper family and running a newspaper route with a neighborhood buddy for the AJC as one of my first jobs, I will admit I have a sentimental as well as logical attachment to the need for local newspapers and their importance in communities large and small.
A longtime friend and colleague in this industry, Dick Williams, an opinion columnist for The Atlanta Journal, owner/editor and publisher of The Crier of Dunwoody, and decades-long host of “The Georgia Gang” on Fox 5 Atlanta, often said the best newspapers must be their community's biggest cheerleader, but when needed, their harshest critic.
He was right, of course, though that’s admittedly a tough balancing act.
And though newspapers may survive online in email newsletters and other platforms, losing a printed newspaper is not as simple as saying goodbye to the buggy whip or moving to a superior platform like email or text over the fax machine.
I already feel bad for those Gen Z members who may never see their picture in the local sports section after a big game win, or their wedding/engagement photos in print, or a detailed obituary of a leading citizen and the contributions they made pinned by a magnet to the kitchen refrigerator.
But most of all, this declining view of the importance of shared community news also allows us to drift further apart.
I don’t absolve or excuse any of the bias or incomplete reporting by larger legacy news outlets. Leaning toward either party, skewing facts to match an agenda, or approaching a story with a predetermined angle, hero, and villain are all wrong.
Reporters also make mistakes, just as people in every profession do. But I don’t have enough space in my weekly column to list the thousands of instances where solid reporting has uncovered corporate greed or larceny, government waste or embezzlement, or resulted in a correction of errors, or making whole of a consumer or enterprise treated wrongly by an errant individual or business.
Those numbers are decidedly higher than the instances of so-called “fake news,” which in and of itself tends to be overstated.
Graduating with a degree in broadcast journalism from the Grady College of Journalism at UGA, generally one of the better-regarded journalism schools in the country, I have worked in and around journalism for more than four decades. Most are underpaid, often overworked, and generally skeptical of authority.
Part of the jobs of the Fourth and Fifth Estates are to question and bring truth to power. But asking even a tough question is still not illegal and often illuminating in simply watching the reaction of seemingly increasingly thin-skinned corporate and government officials, unaccustomed or certainly uncomfortable with having to be accountable to anyone.
If they are available in print, I will have several papers hitting my driveway and front porch each week. Some, like The AJC, will exist only online by the end of this year. I will still subscribe, but I hope that improvements are made to most websites to make them more intuitive or user-friendly. To that end, let’s start with having search engines that actually work!
But losing that common source of community news and outlooks, calendar of events, coverage of good and bad decisions by local government officials, highlights of Friday Night Lights, and significant events and festivals, will be hard to replace through Facebook, Instagram, and other social media outlets.
Big-city dailies, except perhaps The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post, may soon be gone as we know them, though most will continue online. I applaud The AJC for announcing its plans to carry a PDF version, as if still printing the paper, mainly as a convenience for generations of readers still used to consuming their product in that fashion.
If you’re reading this in print, it's still not too late for your local paper. If you feel, even to a small degree, as I do, subscribe, advertise, or give the gift of a print subscription to a neighbor, an older family member, or even your local school library.
I can assure you that each recipient will appreciate the gift, and you’ll be doing your part to help preserve the printed word.