Printed Independent to close in March

This is very sad news. Not all people can or want to read newspapers online and I fear this is the beginning of the end for printed newspapers. I spent 30 years of my life working in Circulation Departments for newspapers and there is a massive industry built up around news distribution and sales. Wholesalers, newsagents, distribution networks and even newspper deliver boys an girls will vanish. There is something about a newspaper or a book that you dont get from the online experience, or maybe I am just old and out of time. I was the forth generation in my family to work for The Times - we all worked in either production and distribution of papers. Another industry that has had its time :lou_sad:

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Did you lament the demise of town crier Soggy? :lou_lol:

Sorry, was just in jest, as I know what you mean, but all things do evolve. The next generation will be comfortable with what they have and wont miss what they dont know… twas always thus.

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:lou_lol: I know what you are saying, but the print industry used to be huge and those who grew up with newspapers will know what a big part they played in people’s lives. Mind you, vinyl is coming back so who knows what the future may bring!

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You can’t really call a newspaper that endorses a political party ahead of a general election “independent”. If they’re still online then hopefully we won’t lose Mark Steel’s column.

Will be interesting to see if they can make a profit from online only.

When I was working for The Guardian we used to laugh at The Independents claim that it was. It got its money from the city then and had its paymasters. The Guardian is still the only true independent paper in that it is run by a trust and the Editor has complete editorial control.

Sad to see the demise of a paper that used to use quality pix really well.

But inevitable.

It’ll probably be the next to go online only. It has always run at a loss, but they sold most of the group last year with a view to making the core business a goer. At the same time, they decided to shit on most of their readership over the Corbyn thing, alienating many, leaving themselves in a spot where they’re having to beg their readers to take on a 50 quid annual subscription. Editorially, it didn’t show a great deal of independence during that episode at all.

I do wonder how much physical form dictates something’s perceived importance. Will the Indy’s move to online only survive without a loss of status? What, apart from history will separate it from any other number of online portals you can get your news from?

Whatever you think of the way they dealt with Corbyn Pap, at least that decision was made editorially and not by some string pulling proprietor.

The Guardian, and the Trust are far from independent, take it from someone who’s other half worked for another company under the trust banner until a couple of years ago…

In what way? The Trust are there to decide upon the Editor and to ensure that the paper continues to run in the way that CP Scott determined when he started the trust. I worked for The Guardian and Observer so dont know much about any of the other companies.

Originally posted by @Sadoldgit

Whatever you think of the way they dealt with Corbyn Pap, at least that decision was made editorially and not by some string pulling proprietor.

What about The Observer’s decision not to go public with the news that there were no WMDs in Iraq?

In autumn 2002 the Observer newspaper’s correspondent Ed Vulliamy found confirmation of a terrible truth many of us already suspected. In a world-exclusive, he persuaded Mel Goodman, a former senior CIA official who still had security clearance at the Agency, to go on record that the CIA knew there were no WMD in Iraq. Everything the US and British governments were telling us to justify the coming attack on Iraq were lies.

Then something even more extraordinary happened. The Observer failed to print the story. In his book Flat Earth News, Nick Davies recounts that Vulliamy, one of the Observer’s most trusted reporters, submitted the piece another six times in different guises over the next half year. Each time the Observer spiked the story.

Vulliamy never went public with this monumental crime against real journalism (should there not be a media trials section at the Hague?). And the supposedly liberal-left Observer was never held accountable for its grave betrayal of its readership and the world community.

They refused to print that story six times, yet it was massively in the public interest.

I cant answer that Pap. I left in 2000 but am surprised that they decided not to run such a big story. These stories have to be run by the company’s lawyers and I know that sometimes certain things get spiked because of security issues, but I would have thought that this would have been perfect for The Observer.