Back in the 1960s when I was sports editor for The Idaho Statesman (circulation right at 50,000 daily, a few thousand more on Sunday), my “To put it Bluntly” column appeared in the Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Sunday editions. Even though I was writing about sports, it was tough coming up with interesting topics five days a week.

The Statesman also used the daily offerings of two of America’s best sports columnists of the day, perhaps ever – Red Smith, first based at the New York Herald Tribune and later at The New York Times, and Jim Murray, based at the Los Angeles Times – and even they had trouble coming up with something compelling five or six times a week. Readers always could tell when Smith was running low on subject matter. He would write about hunting or fishing. Those generally were the only times that Smith, whose columns we bought from a syndicate, wasn’t the best writer in any given week’s sports section. That’s because the then best outdoors writer in America, Ted Trueblood, wrote a Sunday column for the Statesman. That’s tall cotton, folks.

For the last 20 years, I generally have been writing one column a week for The High Point Enterprise’s Sunday opinion page, most of the time commenting on something related to journalism. Oh, yes, I contribute a “Here & There” column on some Fridays that attempts to keep you up to date with what has been happening and what will be happening in the greater High Point community. I was drafted to do that in the 1990s by then Lifestyles editor Judy Phillips after about-town columnist Bobbi Martin died and her successor, former Lifestyles writer Jane Ronalter, left the Enterprise. I had told Phillips that she had to find somebody to continue that type of column in the Enterprise. I’m so thankful we landed Mary Bogest as the Enterprise’s about-town columnist.

As year-end neared and I was running dry on column topics, I asked managing editor Sherrie Dockery and reporter Paul B. Johnson what I might write about today. Johnson responded: “How journalism changed in the decade that’s ending.” Dockery responded: “Where we started as a newspaper in 2009, where we are now and what’s ahead for the new year.”

Both ideas require more research time than I had left in a week interrupted by Christmas, but I will take a stab at telling you where the industry (for mid-sized and smaller newspapers) is today, and take a short stab at what’s ahead for the Enterprise and similar-sized newspapers in North Carolina and surrounding states.

You already know the newspaper industry has suffered as much, if not more, than any industry you can name from this economy and the continuing technological revolution that ever more rapidly changes the playing field level. Even with the recession during the first couple of years of this decade, newspapers (even having to hurdle some rough spots) were doing well until things started to sputter in 2007, continued to falter in 2008 and, especially for larger circulation newspapers, nearly went to hell in a handbasket during 2009.

Results of a survey conducted by the Pew Project for Excellence in Journalism tell us that “journalists who work online are more optimistic about the future of their profession than are news people tied to more traditional media platforms” and they “believe that the Internet is changing the fundamental values of journalism,” and the person writing the summary noted, “more often than not for the worse.”

Glynnis MacNicol, writing for Breaking News, claims much of the media “spent a lot of time chasing non-stories, from Balloon Boy to Sarah Palin’s death panels ... many news organizations, from old media to the new, chase(d) silly, shiny distractions.” She added, “Until someone creates a new, workable business model, the coin of the Internet realm is traffic. And traffic is most cheaply generated by frequency and shock value, two things which are very much at odds with in-depth reporting. None of this is news.”

Survey results show 45 percent of respondents noted a loosening of journalism standards, 31 percent reported hearing more outside voices and 25 percent felt increased emphasis on speed. Meanwhile, 63 percent ranked original reporting as the most important type of information they produce. During the last week of June and the first week of July, Michael Jackson was the dominant story for most of the news media. Pew researchers found Jackson’s death made up 17 percent of a newspaper’s newshole on average, accounted for 30 percent of airtime and 28 percent of cable news. By contrast, the Enterprise used no more than 2 percent of its newshole on any given day during that two-week period reporting (in words and photos) the Jackson story.

Original reporting and heavy emphasis on being intensely local is what is giving mid-sized and smaller circulation the energy and the foundation to (1) weather the storm that was 2009, (2) improve the storytelling, (3) continue to alter, improve and expand content, (4) constantly try new approaches, (5) take full advantage of the technology at its disposal and (6) continue to pursue alternate forms of delivery of news, sports and features.

Keep reading. There’s plenty more to come on what’s ahead.

tblount@hpe.com | 888-3543