hankscott

Why Couldn't Mainstream Media Stick to Its Core Competency?

The core competency of newspapers isn't production or distribution. The core competency of media companies in modern times has been aggregating audiences for advertisers by providing those audiences with compelling and relevant news content. (In olden days, before the development of the advertising industry, newspapers got all of their revenue from circulation). Think of printing presses as the manufacturing equivalent of web servers. Think of newspaper carriers as the physical equivalent of ISPs.

So what happens when someone is able to more efficiently aggregate advertisers without providing news (e.g. Google)? That's the dilemma newspapers face today.