Joe

Newspapers: Not a Zero-Sum Game - A Minus-Sum Game

It's an interesting article. I dare to throw in a few more points:
right now there only is talk of newspaper ad revenue. What is maybe
still to come are considerations or facts for whatever about the
total ad spending.
Consider for instance ad spending for the auto industry 2006:
$ 13,5 billion, not included car dealers.
Chrysler was bought for $ 7,4 Billion last year by Cerberus.
(I just lifted this from the net: a Nielsen report to that:)
www.nielsenmedia.com/n...

Ad spending all in all could be considered huge, irrespective of how
the economy is doing.
And this, also just lifted from the net, total ad for 2007:
adage.com/mediaworks/a...

Ironically formulated, ad spending is some sort of pagan religion
guaranteeing all sort of miracles, ranging from resuscitating someone
from the dead to healing all sorts of other illnesses, and certainly,
on top of that, ad spending works wonders in each and every
case for the advertiser. A company only has to spend sufficiently
and the success is guaranteed. (Just contact any of the big
ad agencies and you're in touch with the super-natural.)

And on not to forget the consumers who sometimes have the
habit of blocking, averting, skipping TV ad for instance, ot
shaking out all the fliers, etc. coming with a paper, before they
start reading it. ...
Somehow it is a matter of "conflict" and interest, of cost -
efficiency, of consumer habits and so forth. An open matter in
my opinion.