Mike Maisel

The Latest Nail In Newspapers' Coffin: Outsourcing

How can it make sense to make cuts that will directly impact the product, potentially weakening it? So many papers are making just these kinds of cuts now, and these will only serve to lock them into a death sprial. If readers are deserting you because they find other media more suitable, the better course would seem to be to remake your product tailored to evolving media consumption tastes, but not to poke more holes in the already leaky boat.

In announcing personnel cuts of 22% (Web editorial staff was not part of this, by the way), Editor Cliff Teutsch told staff the cuts "add a sober reality for all as we continue to remake the paper for a September launch." See the key words there, "remake the paper."

Maybe it's just spin, but remaking your product to be more relevant, more accessible, more user-friendly just makes a lot more sense than commoditizing it by outsourcing core journalism functions or dictating arbitrary editorial to advertising ratios. Or maybe, I'm just too much a fan of literacy.