Good morning! Today’s newsletter is brought to you by Chris.
There’s just one month to go until Mx3 AI; a live event in London from Media Voices and Media Makers Meet. We’ll be featuring sessions on AI in local, national, consumer and B2B media, as well as discussions on innovation, developments and regulation.
I was chatting with a journalist mate immediately after this news broke yesterday, and he said “sure would be nice to work in a sustainable business”. I don’t know if I can put it any better than that, to be honest. This is a horrible situation for everyone involved – not just the one in ten people who will lose their jobs at the regional publisher, but for their colleagues who will have the survivor’s guilt.
“In its third quarter trading update, Reach reported a 13.7% drop in digital revenue as online page views slumped by 21% year-on-year in the first nine months. Total print revenues also fell by 6% with income from newspaper sales and advertising declining.” Maybe that digital revenue drop is due to the absolutely abysmal state of its local news sites, which are often unreadable without ad-blockers?
One thing is absolutely for sure. The inability of Reach’s executives to hit its targets is not the fault of the journalists who will lose their jobs. Instead, as ever, it will be the hard-working people who bear the brunt of cuts that are nothing to do with their performance. Our hearts go out to everyone affected here – and if there is anything tangible Media Voices can do to help please do let us know.
On the other end of the scale, it’s good news for the NYT. The New York-based publication, one of the darlings of the newspaper subscription world, has passed 10 million subscribers according to its latest quarterly report. It also announced an adjusted operating profit of $89.8 million in its latest quarter, no small sum and no small feat.
Although we reported on the appointment of Bryan West – Gannett’s new dedicated Taylor Swift reporter – a few days ago, we are not becoming a Taylor Swift newsletter. Yet. No, I’m including this because Parker Molloy has brought together eight journalists and writers to examine the future of music journalism. Now, if anyone reading this is looking for a dedicated We Are Scientists reporter, my DMs are open…
We have a section on our Media Voices Community Forum dedicated to chatting about non-media stuff – which happens to include music (though Tay-Sway has yet to be mentioned). If you want to recommend any bands, or find some inspiration, come join us.
Every time I read about ITV’s performance I’m struck by how absolutely dependent the UK commercial broadcaster appears to be on shows designed to be exported to the US. Its raft of reality TV programming seems to be the bedrock upon which the rest of the business is based. Anyway, it’s the same old story – linear decreases in viewership and revenue, partially offset by its digital activity.
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