Scratch Knight Ridder. Insert McClatchy. And hold on for some big changes in the regional newspaper business.
McClatchy is not perfect, but it is much more committed to letting local papers actually reflect local interests than the top-down KR regime. McClatchy has also been much more open to embracing the Internet, as anyone who frequents both the N&O’s and the local KR outlet’s sites can attest. The McClatchy’s sites are run locally rather than shoe-horned into a national template.
For the Carolinas the sale could bring a totally new news focus. The KR outlet has tried to function as the Carolinas flagship paper, covering the entire region rather than burrowing in deep on Mecklenburg County. But with McClatchy’s four daily and eight weekly papers thrown into the mix, the old approach seems destined to be abandoned. Each paper would seem to have a ready-made local footprint for coverage and circulation and little incentive to duplicate efforts.
Plus the KR penchant for long, pointless series undertaken with the hopes of winning awards and thus impressing the KR corporate chain of command may be done, over. For example, the altogether absurd series on mortgage lending stands as a monument to KR’s failed approach to journalism: The news is what we say it is, the facts be damned.
Recall that series was framed by editor Rick Thames thusly: “Today we learn that to be black in America is to be much more likely to pay a higher interest rate for a home purchase loan.” Nevermind that what lending data actually indicate is that anyone with a lower credit score gets a higher interest rate. Journalistic malpractice at its finest.
As noted, the new McClatchy bosses are not saints and may look at their new-found Carolinas hegemony as license to push pet issues or causes. But the stunning growth of alt-media — not just blogs and the Net, but functioning niche publications with plenty of advertisers — should blunt that impulse.
In sum, the sale is change, and change is good.
