As the Seattle Post-Intelligencer joins the ranks of the online-only, Gawker's Hamilton Nolan makes the case for media outlets "doing less with less":
Instead of clinging to its old model unto death, a newspaper could ask itself: How much of this crap in our paper do we actually need? How many papers need a food section or a fashion section? None, really, if they don't bring in ad money. The Seattle P-I is focusing on what it needs: Seattle news and commentarianism. Local papers could cut back to covering local governments, sports, and crime. The number of US papers that can truly justify publishing a book review, or a weekly magazine, or extensive movie coverage can be counted on fewer than one hand's worth of fingers. [Emphasis included in original post.]
Every media form -- newspapers, magazines, TV shows, etc. -- is covered in fat, and it's high time organizations cut the blubbery detritus from their offerings. But I've got misgivings about the Seattle P-I's new set-up, even though its proposed lean-and-mean model seems sound:
The message is that Hearst executives believe they can produce the essence of what they do now -- a local-news product, with a personality, that offers unique, high-quality content -- with 20 journalists who both cover news and curate everything else on the internet to give their readers a package that gives them a sense of what is happening in their town.
Here's the rub: it's infinitely easier to aggregate other people's coverage than to create your own (the blogosphere's exponential growth is driven by this essential truth). Yet, for all the frustrations and costs incurred from crafting content, original material is one of the Web's naturally scarce products. It has built-in value.
The P-I's editors are going to face their own Dagobah challenge: can they resist the dark lure of aggregate first, report second? Can they follow Jeff Jarvis' advice and "cover what you do best and link to the rest"?
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