International Law

How newspapers failed to invent the web

In Slate Jack Shafer has a great piece that charts the various attempts the newspaper industry have made to respond to new technologies, before explaining how ultimately the newspaper industry has failed when it comes to the internet:

Newspapers deserve bragging rights for having homesteaded the Web long before most government agencies and major corporations knew what a URL was. Given the industry's early tenancy, deep pockets, and history of paranoid experimentation with new communication forms, one would expect to find plenty in the way of innovations and spinoffs.

But that's not the case, and I think I know why: From the beginning, newspapers sought to invent the Web in their own image by repurposing the copy, values, and temperament found in their ink-and-paper editions. Despite being early arrivals, despite having spent millions on manpower and hardware, despite all the animations, links, videos, databases, and other software tricks found on their sites, every newspaper Web site is instantly identifiable as a newspaper Web site. By succeeding, they failed to invent the Web.

Read more here.

Full post as published by Freedom to Differ on January 09, 2009 (boomark / email).