|
|
Article: The Wichita experiment: what happens when a newspaper tries to connect readership and citizenship? (Wichita Eagle)
- Article from:
- Columbia Journalism Review
- Article date:
- July 1, 1992
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1992 Columbia University, Graduate School of Journalism. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
|
Two familiar refrains: if newspapers don't learn to listen to readers and adapt to the way they live, they'll die. And if newspapers treat their content as a mere commodity, they'll lose their souls. And damage democracy. And die anyway.
Newspaper people, as Des Moines Register editor Geneva Overholser noted in a recent speech, are dividing into camps -- the "News Readers Need" bunch vs. the "News Readers Want" gang or, as she described the opposing forces' descriptions of each other, "Arrogant Editors Who Think They Know Everything Yet Are Hopelessly Out of Touch With Their Readers" vs. "Finger to the Wind Marketers Dumbing Down the Newspaper at all Costs."
...