I don’t consider myself old-fashioned
… yet. I text, I send e-mails, I know how to work a computer
most of the time. But I am old-fashioned in one sense – my love of
the old-school printed newspaper.
I don’t consider myself old-fashioned … yet. I text, I send e-mails, I know how to work a computer most of the time. But I am old-fashioned in one sense – my love of the old-school printed newspaper.
I am genuinely disappointed when I walk out into the cold morning air and can’t locate my morning newspaper. I also don’t like when it gets rained on, because then it becomes a chore to read it without having the pages fall apart. But through it all, it’s like opening a present every day.
There’s just something about rolling off the rubber band and unfolding the paper on the kitchen counter. Maybe someone got shot; maybe someone I know did something extraordinary; maybe there’s a cool picture that catches my eye. I love reading about criminal sentencings and foreclosure notices and checking the box scores to see how my students did in a game.
I like when Ruth Erickson holds the paper’s feet to the fire in a letter to the editor or Andrew Matheson covers the heck out of San Benito High School sports. Nick Lovejoy’s pictures are as good as you can see in a big metropolitan daily.
I like being able to read about my community when I’m on the couch, or in bed, or eating cereal, not just when I’m sitting at my computer desk.
Some days are better than others news-wise, but they joy of cracking open the paper is one that I have cherished for years.
When I opened the paper last week and read that the Free Lance was converting to a twice-weekly publication with a greater Web presence, it was upsetting. The paper has arrived at my house for 27 years, heralding births and deaths, offering a forum for opinions, and showcasing the best and worst of San Benito County.
*The Free Lance offered me my first “real” job as a reporter 15 years ago and allowed me to find my calling. Fresh out of college, the $325 a week they were paying made me feel rich after I had made $100 a month working for my college paper. Since I wouldn’t leave, they kept promoting me until I became the editor, which was a thankless but utterly rewarding task. Our staff took pride in our “Local people, local paper, for generations” motto.
After leaving the paper in 1999 to work at Santa Clara University, many people still thought I still worked here – especially when they noticed a mistake in print. I remained a faithful reader after my departure, and took an even more active interest when I returned as a columnist a few years back.
I don’t work in the newsroom now and only know a few people who work at the paper, but I still feel like part of the family. So this news about the “transition” and “new initiatives” has affected me.
I understand the cold realities of the newspaper business. There is stiff competition from the Internet. Advertisers have options; readers have options. Anyone can have a blog or a Web site these days – you don’t need a journalism degree or have to follow a style manual. Pictures can be posted online a few seconds after they are taken; stories can be updated throughout the day on the Web. It is progress, baby, and we can either accept it or miss the boat.
It’s not just the Free Lance that is changing. The San Jose Mercury News, to which I also subscribe, recently made the decision to only cover high schools in Santa Clara County, meaning that Hollister and Anzar get short-changed. A person at the Merc told my dad in an e-mail that “staffing and budget constraints” were the cause, she hoped that “some new Web tools” may help, and added that she hopes it “isn’t a permanent situation.”
I’m guessing there’s no turning back now, so there’s no point in whining: I don’t like that my formerly daily paper only comes out twice a week, but I won’t abandon it. I will check hollisterfreelance.com on non-printing days and hope that my community gets the coverage it deserves.
This local person likes his local paper and hopes it will stick around for generations to come – in whatever form that may be.
