Is Print Dead?

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(The following is adapted from the Keynote Convocation speech I gave at the San Jose State University Journalism School graduation on Thursday, May 22, 2008.)

Everyone with half a brain in this industry has finally awakened and is trying everything from remodeling how we present print products to cutting deals with Google and Yahoo to capture more of their revenue from our work. And they will keep on thrashing and experimenting.

The core thing to remember is that it’s not journalism that’s broken. It’s the advertising model.

The fact that free ads on the internet have gutted our ads in print and broadcast doesn’t mean our story coverage is bad – it just means the ad model has morphed. But I believe we will hang in there. We’re pretty smart in this business, and we’ll figure it out. Especially with the still-eager waves of young talent that keep pouring out of universities wanting to join the newspaper trade despite the drumbeat of doom and gloom.

I see these internet operations that now dig at our flanks as seeds. They will grow. We in the so-called mainstream media may meld into them, they may meld into us, but whatever happens, I know that one thing will eventually result:  The news will continue to be told, and it will be told by professionals.

It has to. The capriciousness of public whim, business models and just plain bad luck haven’t managed to kill off journalism so far, and it never will.

I had a media professional tell me about a year ago that we don’t really need reporters anymore because we can just get interested folks to blog from their living rooms from wherever the news is – like Iraq, or a shooting scene, or City Hall.  I found this not just hilarious, but insulting. Even frightening.

I don’t think Joe Blow could have had the same balanced eye I’d like to believe I brought to covering 9-11 at Ground Zero. Or watching any of the seven executions I’ve witnessed at San Quentin. Or sleeping alongside homeless junkies in San Francisco to understand how far their lives had sunk.

We’re not playing at this thing we do here. It is dead serious stuff. And it’s hard work. That thing journalism school teachers say about how you’d better be doing journalism because you love it, not because you want to get rich? It is absolutely true.

My first jobs paid pretty badly in places like Glendale, Lodi, and Fremont, and even London and New Zealand. But I didn’t care. I was so happy to be actually writing for a living that sometimes I even forgot to pick up my paycheck. True story. If the rent was paid and the wolves weren’t at the door, who cares?  I just wanted to meet fascinating people, see amazing things, try to make a positive difference in life, and then write my head off. I couldn’t imagine anything more perfect.

I still can’t. And I know I’m not alone. There are too many of us out here to let the craft of truly gathering and writing news die.