Guest Contribution by David Lance
As you may be aware, the Boston Globe, our local paper, is in danger of being shut down--at least the print edition! This has caused one of my readers--David Lance--great angst and some great creativity.. In fact, in his ruminations (below), he came up with some market research suggestions for the Globe and their Union, a Vision of what a useful newspaper should be, and a business plan!!!
Here are Dave's thoughts:
It occurs to me that the Boston Globe union concessions that were made last week did not factor in a single contact by anyone to ask me (the bloody customer) what I want. When customers are so blatantly ignored by the owners and the unions, what can we do to be heard? Since nobody has asked, here are my answers to the questions they might have asked:
- While I like reading news on the Web, it is sporadic and more a distraction than focused information gathering, or relaxed entertainment – such as I get from reading newsprint.
- I dislike the clutter of www.boston.com.
- I love the feeling I get when reading something really compelling from physical newsprint paper while eating a bagel. Perhaps that is reason enough to preserve the media. Perhaps not. Somebody from the newspaper industry might study a person thus focused on a Sunday morning, and create some giveaway accessories they could use to entice some of us back above the fold. Maybe some little gizmo that reliably keeps the orange juice off the bed sheets - for example.
- I want reporters to uncover what I want to read about. I would pay for that.
It would be really nice (not to mention extremely savvy), if somebody from the New York Times or the local unions would maybe talk to me before conceding they can not entice me to trade a hundred pennies for a copy of their newspaper every day.
Recent Comments