"Print is not dead but in a new phase of its life cycle"

After an unprecedented series of breakups by major US media conglomerates, the print newspaper industry now faces a thorny future, without the financial support of its parent companies.

Illustration photo. Source: AP

The wave of media conglomerate splits comes at a time when newspapers and magazines are struggling to transition to digital, and media conglomerate shareholders are increasingly unsympathetic to print.

Gannett — which owns USA Today and dozens of other newspapers — is the latest conglomerate to announce plans to split its print and television operations into two separate units, aiming to increase the professionalism of each.

The move comes after Tribute Co. spun off the Los Angeles Times and Chicago Tribute newspapers, and Time Warner spun off Time Inc. magazine.

Last month, two media companies, EW Scripps and Journal Communications, after announcing their merger, also decided to separate their print newspaper division from the company, to focus entirely on television and digital media.

The trend is said to have started last year when media mogul Rupert Murdoch split his News Corp empire into two segments: media-entertainment and publishing.

In the face of a wave of American print newspapers being separated from their parent companies, Mr. Mark Jurkowitz, deputy director of the Pew Research Center's Journalism Project, said that this action is like "children being thrown out of the house by their parents."

During the period when newspapers brought huge profits, media companies quickly "grabbed" this segment.

But now, other areas of media, such as television, dominate the profits of media companies. Mr. Jurkowitz also said that “the market doesn’t seem to care much about the future of print anymore.”

Although many print newspapers still generate an average profit margin of about 16% (higher than Walmart or Amazon), in recent years, digital news has gradually replaced the once-dominant print press, says media consultant Alan Mutter.

Mr. Mutter said that newspapers are increasingly dependent on technology giants like Google, Facebook and Twitter to generate traffic, the lifeblood of media corporations.

Dan Kennedy, a journalism professor at Northeastern University, said the newspaper industry is recovering from the negative impact of previous separation deals.

Mr. Kennedy commented that the newspaper industry's profits are still quite stable, and if owned by private businesses without debt, there will certainly be newspapers that "do" well.

Some analysts say the breakup of large media conglomerates could force publishers to find ways to connect with readers online.

The real problem with the newspaper industry, according to Mr. Jurkowitz, is not dealing with a “dead branch,” but rather the failure to monetize digital media today.

The newspaper industry is closely watching the efforts of newspapers like the New York Times — which is experimenting with new digital access plans — and the Washington Post — which under new owner Jeff Bezos has raised online readership to record highs.

Professor Kennedy argues that while print newspapers can be profitable and an important part of the community, they still cannot meet Wall Street's expectations for growth.

However, Mr Kennedy also stressed that private owners could still continue to grow their businesses and that print newspapers needed to invest significantly to transition to digital technology in the coming years.

Peter Copeland, a former editor of Scripps Howard News Service and now a media consultant, said separating newspapers from their multimedia parent companies is a logical and generally positive trend for newspapers.

He stressed that it would be better for print and television to be separate, as they never go together and are very different businesses.

“I think print is entering a new era,” he said. “It’s not the end, it’s just a phase in the life cycle of print.”

According to Vietnam+