What's up with newspapers?

Marjorie Suddard wrote: There have ALWAYS been new car reviews in GRM. I wrote the one for the Miata when it came out. But otherwise, you're completely right, we're total sellouts. Also, all Green Day from Dookie on has sucked. Margie

Oh I know. I'm not disagreeing with the new car reviews, as typically they are good.

But to say everyone else is sellouts, and then gloss over foibles of GRM's own (big non-removable thick card stock advertising page, mustangs on every other cover for the better part of a year being a few, this may be an exaggeration) is kinda like huh? I like your magazine. I subscribe. I will continue to do so, and continue to make fun of people who read "other" terrible magazines. The day I stop subscribing will be the day you start advertising male enhancement drugs in the back pages... the March 2012 Motor Trend (my father bought it, don't ask) actually has cigarette ads in it. My mind was blown!

And yes, Green Day and RHCP do suck nowadays

Screw the newspaper thread. Keep 'em coming, Eddie!

fast_eddie_72 wrote:

z31maniac wrote: People don't want to start paying for something they've been getting for free for a decade.

But they don't mind complaining about how bad it is...

I've made that point about many other things as well. People shop on price and not value.

Just like teachers, people want better ones, but aren't willing to pay for them. I'd love to go back and be a teacher here in OK.

But even at only 30 years old, going back to teach would cut my salary in HALF.

People aren't willing to pay the property tax increases, and do away with protecting those who suck at their jobs, to get the cream of the crop from college into the classrooms.

Marjorie Suddard wrote: Screw the newspaper thread. Keep 'em coming, Eddie!

One more leaps to mind. Sends chills down your spine.

Nick Cave doing Mercy Seat.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFVZUg48-8g

Damn that was a great show.

In my local case, it'd be much easier to endure if the local paper would increase the quality of it's paper. I'm certainly not paying for a paper that has stunk it up with sub-standard content for literally decades now. People who put out a quality product have a better argument.

Smaller newspapers will eventually be gone. People don't want to pay for quality. I don't want GRM to go full digital until my 10 year subscription is up.

Joe Gearin wrote: Some of the counterpoints have been very negative and brutally honest.

I had to stop myself on a recent Fiat 500c review. My initial reaction was, "I'd rather have a Kia Rio, or possibly herpes."

Per Schroeder wrote:

Joe Gearin wrote: Some of the counterpoints have been very negative and brutally honest.

I had to stop myself on a recent Fiat 500c review. My initial reaction was, "I'd rather have a Kia Rio, or possibly herpes."

Now that is more like it. If you can't get Fiat advertising because you were honest - maybe you can get the Zovirax people to run a crotch creme full page spread.

Marjorie Suddard wrote: Little hint: This board is subsidized by subscriber dollars. The advertising doesn't even cover monthly maintenance, never mind staff time or server fees. Margie

Now is when I lobby for beatification by pointing out (again) that I subscribed in order to support the forum, not because of the magazines.

Marjorie Suddard wrote: People should demand better news, the same way they demand better repair work (or, in our case, better hobbyist info). In the case of news, however, it's crucial to a democracy. Like, the cornerstone. And we gave it up due to cheapness, along with a lot of other democratic ideals

Filter Bubbles have ruined online news, too

In reply to Giant Purple Snorklewacker:

I'm not sure anyone wants a full spread of crotch cream. That's something you do out of necessity, not desire.

I read the Huffington Post and the Drudge Report, and only take as fact the parts that overlap.

JoeyM wrote:

Marjorie Suddard wrote: Little hint: This board is subsidized by subscriber dollars. The advertising doesn't even cover monthly maintenance, never mind staff time or server fees. Margie

Now is when I lobby for beatification by pointing out (again) that I subscribed in order to support the forum, not because of the magazines.

Marjorie Suddard wrote: People should demand better news, the same way they demand better repair work (or, in our case, better hobbyist info). In the case of news, however, it's crucial to a democracy. Like, the cornerstone. And we gave it up due to cheapness, along with a lot of other democratic ideals

Filter Bubbles have ruined online news, too

No wonder I can't find the images I I'm looking for anymore..my interests are pretty diverse, I think I confuse it. I know I've been confusing the suggestion bot at Amazon for years..

Otto Maddox wrote: I read the Huffington Post and the Drudge Report, and only take as fact the parts that overlap.

Ugh, this one drives me nuts.

For the most part, you don't read "Drudge," he just links to outside news stories. And he links to a variety of stories.

Now, he does present his own, sometimes misleading, headlines to the outside stories.

But certainly you aren't the type that only reads the headlines, are you?

...which is pretty much what every populist news source does these days. I'm convinced 80% of the world's "news" is written by about 30 people in Bangalore, but it's impossible to trace the tangled knot of sources back to them.

I've given up on news mostly. It seems no can simply tell the news anymore. Everyone has to put their slant on it, which goes against everything i learned taking journalism in college back when the earth was cooling.

Personally, I think 24 hour news channels have obliterated the truth in all newscasts. But that's another story for another day.

When I got out of TV a few years ago, this was starting to affect them as well. We were producing about 20 or so shows in various markets, and selling spots was increasingly difficult, with revenues dropping rapidly. And when you got an advertiser, they wanted online content FREE, no excuses no barginining. It's an extremely difficult market to be in right now, and the changes are going to get worse from here, not better.

Personally, I see a time when fewer and fewer scripted shows will appear on TV. It may be 10 or so years down the road, but unless they can find other revenue streams, it will become too expensive. Even Coke announced the other day they are greatly scaling back TV advertising.

So, I think newspapers will all but disappear sooner rather than later, with maybe only a few specialty ones remaining in large circulation. Even the New York times is hurting, and they've all resorted to pandering. It's very sad really.

And to Margie, i still have that Miata review somewhere...I think I'm getting old, and worse yet, I still consider it a new car!

Alan Cesar wrote: In reply to Giant Purple Snorklewacker: I'm not sure anyone wants a full spread of crotch cream.

Wrong publication, anyway....I am pretty sure that those companies should advertise in Makes and Models Magazine

Jay wrote: ...which is pretty much what every populist news source does these days. I'm convinced 80% of the world's "news" is written by about 30 people in Bangalore, but it's impossible to trace the tangled knot of sources back to them.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record- even that doesn't accommodate local news. Before long, you'll pretty much only have the TV people. Good people, seriously, but much smaller staff and less room to report anything than the papers had. New York, LA, Chicago, and maybe Philly will be big enough to let good local news survive in some form, but places like Denver will have to make do with very short stories about important local issues- so we can spend seven minutes looking at another weather map and hearing what the sports guy thinks the football team should do this year.

Jay wrote: ...which is pretty much what every populist news source does these days. I'm convinced 80% of the world's "news" is written by about 30 people in Bangalore, but it's impossible to trace the tangled knot of sources back to them.

It's in Oceana. I used to work in the RecDep at Minitrue "rectifying" newspaper articles so they matched party line.

The OP's original point was that he disagreed with paying for online news. I don't know if he subscribes to the papers he mentioned, but it should be a given that one way or another you need to pay for a product. I subscribe to two newspapers, one Provincial and one National. As part of my subscription, I have access to the online versions. If I did not buy the subscription, I would not get the online access. My issue with the online editions is that they don't read very well. They have slightly different formats, but neither are as comfortable as leaning over my kitchen table with a coffee and flipping pages. The Ipad versions are much better, but there is still something missing there. I understand that one day there will be no print edition, and I am OK with that, but I hope they can refine the reading experience.

HiTempguy wrote: Just to point out, GRM (since I started subscribing) HAS started to go the way most magazines do. The new mustang coverage is getting nauseating,

And on a totally unrelated flounder, I overheard a discussion at the last Dallas Cars for Coffee regarding the limited space for cars and what cars should be excluded. Just about everybody agreed that they need to ban new mustangs because there were just too many of them (two rows of just the new ones) and they were boring. I don't care if it's a Shelby this or a Saleen that or if the owner spent 90K building it into a fire breathing road racer. They all look too much like the V6, automatic transmissioned new mustangs you see all over town. And there seem to be twice as many of them as there are new Camaros and new Challengers. So keep the entire row of new Lamborghinis, yes, even the Tribant and the Yugo are cool. Even let a few Jeeps and Land Cruisers in the front gate. And no, we are not talking about the guy with the Pro Touring '65 with big fender flairs or the ratty Fox body with the full cage. Those are still cool. But put all the new Mustangs in the spectator's lot with all the tow vehicles and the Camrys.

It does make you think about how popular the new Mustang covers are when the guys at Cars and Coffee are getting sick of seeing new Mustangs.

HiTempguy wrote: Just to point out, GRM (since I started subscribing) HAS started to go the way most magazines do. The new mustang coverage is getting nauseating, and having reviews of every car go "yes, it's good! *insert one or two small complaints here*" is starting to get borderline motortrend. Not even pointing out the fact about NEW cars in GRM (not that that is an inherently bad thing)...

I know this isn't the point of the topic but this bothered me. The last time I picked up a Motortrend was the last because of an article about a new car. I don't remember the car offhand, however there were exactly 3 sentences about how it drove. The rest of the page long article was complaints about "hard plastic" and 2 paragraphs or so devoted to the fact that it does not have some 3 blink change lane feature. I put the magazine down and decided that if all Motortrend and Car and Driver care about is plastic and a lack of a feature I have no desire to read or buy it ever again.

GRM is the ONLY magazine I subscribe to now because despite what I may think of the aesthetics of a particular car when I drive it I tend to agree with their review. Every single other rag I've picked up reads like an over privileged auto-journalist complaining that an Nissan Versa doesn't have the same fit and finish as an S class.

My favorite part of GRM is the buyers guides with the breakdown of the changes by year. They've come in handy more times than I can count. I'd really like to find one for the RX-7 FD or have someone tell me which one to order so I can get the back issue....

I personally like popping open the paper and reading it, getting ink on my fingers etc, that's part of the experience. Online just isn't the same. But I don't like paying for garbage content; for instance up here everyone is nuts for University of SC football (no I am not a football fan) and that will take up at least 1/4 to 1/3 of the front page above the fold almost every day. If I see one more front page story about how Steve Spurrier is a combination of Einstein and John F Kennedy I might go postal. That's why I won't subscribe to The State even though I miss the paper comics. But at least I can go to gocomics.com, keep killing the popups and get my daily giggles. Fo' free.

So at least the online version allows me to get around that front page idiocy pretty quick. But, the online version does not require a printing press, armies of delivery persons, etc and I have to cough up for a computer, Internet service, electricity etc to read the damn thing so why the hell should I pay a subscription for it? That's what the advertising is for.

About to do two things (when I'm back home and using my own internet connection instead of less trustworthy internet links); Salon "core" membership, and getting a sunday only subscription to the NY Times. They have an easy to read website, one of the best, but the NYT is just so nice to have in paper and hold in my hands.

I don't really care about local news outside of the business section that only covers the industry I work in. Which is probably not a Good Thing but that's how it is.

z31maniac wrote:

Otto Maddox wrote: I read the Huffington Post and the Drudge Report, and only take as fact the parts that overlap.

Ugh, this one drives me nuts. For the most part, you don't read "Drudge," he just links to outside news stories. And he links to a variety of stories. Now, he does present his own, sometimes misleading, headlines to the outside stories. But certainly you aren't the type that only reads the headlines, are you?

I've got to start using the damn emoticons. Drudge was just the first conservative website that came to mind. But good point that it is merely links.

I read The Onion News for free. It is full of amazing news stories that the WSJ seems to miss. You should check it out.