Sad day - DJ's Blog - Operation Sports

DJ's Blog

Sad day

Posted on February 27, 2009 at 11:17 AM.

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Well, it's over. After nearly 150 years in existence, The Rocky Mountain News published its final newspaper today. As a jouranlist, this is a sad day.

While the Rocky was a competitior, the people that worked there were also colleagues in this fun and crazy world of journalism. I grew to know several of the writers there closely, and consider them friends. It sickens me to think that they are now unemployed, forced to look for work in a bleak economy - it seems just about everyone is struggling these days.

I had the opportunity to write several stories for the paper, and I felt honoroed each time I was asked to contribute a piece; even if it was something as small as covering a high school basketball game.

The era of 2-newspaper cities is coming to quick end. Seattle is soon to experience the same fate as Denver. Like many colleagues, journalism is my life. It's sad to see fewer options out there for writers to perform their craft. With such a specialized field, it's hard to imagine doing anything else, quite honestly.

Where do we go from here? I don't know. Media, not just newspapers, are struggling to generate revenue. I'm not a big numbers guy, so I don't try to analyze and make sense of things I don't understand.

All I can do is hope that this truly is just a large down-tick in a cyclical business.

God speed, Rocky. You were a blast to compete against, and a joy to read.

Comments

# 1 BlyGilmore @ Feb 27

Newspapers have been in trouble for a while now and sadly this is probably not going to be the only newspaper to close its doors as a result of current tough economic times.

A big part of the problem is newspapers seeming inability to adapt to new technology and the Internet. Tons of papers are still playing catchup and trying to figure out the best way to translate what they do to an electronic medium.

That failure to adapt has left a lot of newspapers still very dependant on old advertising revenue sources from industries that are in peril - namely car dealerships and department stores.

# 2 RogueHominid @ Feb 27

Man, that sucks. So many hard working people are struggling right now. I know what you mean about not knowing what else you'd do with your life--I feel the same way about being a scholar. Sounds like you're lucky to have a job in your industry--hopefully things get better soon and your now unemployed colleagues find something.