Small Papers   

AJR columnist John Morton missed the mark by referring to the small daily newspaper market as less vulnerable to failure than the metro dailies (Not Dead Yet, June/July). Take a look at CNHI and GateHouse Media for proof that small dailies are becoming extinct at an alarming rate, too many of them bound by their own unwillingness to admit that local news is still a salable product.

Morton also overlooked a segment of the newspaper industry that is stable and often experiencing growth — the non-daily publications that eventually will serve the very markets where small dailies are failing.

Rudy Taylor

Taylor Newspapers of Southeast Kansas

Caney, Kansas

As the owner of a weekly newspaper for more than 50 years, I eagerly opened AJR to read "Cities Without Newspapers," highlighted on the cover of your June/July issue. I was astounded to read your entire article without a single mention of the word "ideology," which is the prime reason for the demise of many of the newspapers you mention. It would be like writing a story about a person dying of cancer and not mentioning the cancer. Those of us in the profession saw it coming. How long could a business continue to provide a faulty product to a customer before the customer said, "Enough." Small-town newspapers without major debt will survive quite well. We will not be able to sell our businesses, unless we literally give them away, because the next owner cannot make it with a large mortgage. Just add newspapers to the list of "buggy whips" of history.

John P. Kameen

President

Forest City News

Forest City, Pennsylvania

AJR and its reporters need to be slapped out of their overweening arrogance where print media and journalism is concerned. Fortunately, John Morton recognized this in his column in the June/July edition. The rest of the AJR writers need to read his column.

For the record: The majority of print journalists in the nation do not work for major daily newspapers. Never have. Never will. Don't want to.

"Almost 6,700 weekly newspapers circulated in the United States in 2004 with a total circulation, both paid and free, of about 21 million," according to MSN Encarta. That's low, I suspect.

The arrogance that AJR and its writers display in writing about print journalism as if the only ones that matter are major dailies is the exact problem that major dailies have. Arrogance. Pride. A belief that they are "too big to fail," which as we are seeing now is not the case.

It is time to get over yourselves. Those of us on small community weekly newspapers don't just get the story. We help. We make a personal connection you refuse to make. We make that connection to every single person in our community.

You think in terms of readers. We think in terms of neighbors.

Ben Baker

Editor

Wiregrass Farmer

Ashburn, Georgia