More Economics - New Business Model for College Newspapers

Found an interesting story online regarding our last class on the economics of news -- linked from a fellow college journalist's Twitter account -- about new business models for college newspapers.

Blogger Greg Linch makes the point that journalists, especially those in college, need to become not only strong journalists, but effective videographers, photographers, and web designers -- and, now, business agents, as newspaper advertising revenues continue to drop (see graph).

Perhaps this is even more (sadly) relevant in light of the fact that the UCLA Daily Bruin ran an ad on the front page of their paper today.

UPDATE: More on the Daily Bruin's front-page ad (which looks like an incredible replica of the real paper), plus photos.


Linch's proposition? College news should look to make revenue from the continued support of advertisers, but also from offering specialized university services for off-campus companies and working on campus as surveyors gathering advertising input for company-customers. Linch goes so far as to propose that college journalists working at school papers should earn more $$ by creating websites and a social networking presence for advertisers.

What do you guys think? Should we really be expected to be jacks and jills of every trade imaginable? Is this a realistic expectation of professional journalists and, perhaps even more importantly, college journalists?

As a journalism and digital media double-major, I already feel like I'm trying to hit every base in order to be "prepared" for the new journalism world on the cusp of emerging. What if even this isn't enough? I feel like expectations are starting to get a little out of hand...


Also, for more thoughts from the writer of today's reading, The People Formerly Known as the Audience, check out Jay Rosen's Twitter musings on the state of the news media and social networking.

One more question to add to the mix, based off Mr. Rosen's article: Is it possible there is a monopoly of people formerly known as the audience who dominate new media, or are all users and all citizens blogging, Twittering, and contributing to the new media discourse? What kind of a frame or slant could this lend to the world of citizen media?