Once a month, I have an appointment with the readers of the Montreal Gazette. Since 2020, I have been a columnist there. This newspaper, which celebrates its 245e anniversary this year and which is the oldest daily newspaper in Canada, has had a difficult last few weeks. First there was the announcement of new layoffs, then, last Friday, the names of the people who would leave the newspaper were revealed. Craftsmen of the trade who all deserve the title they are too modest to accept: that of legend.
You always have to worry when a newsroom downsizes. And since the announcement of the Montreal Gazette, several elected officials and readers shared their collective fear of seeing this newspaper one day disappear and, for the moment, of seeing that it has even fewer resources to cover, in particular, local news. Local news represents an important social fabric in all markets. It is no less so when it is written in English, in a French-speaking province. On the contrary.
A reduction in staff also means fewer resources to produce a paper version. It may be my romantic side, but paper is still an important tool for me. In newspaper or magazine format, I still subscribe to it. Not being a dinosaur, I obviously also recognize the importance of digital. My many subscriptions prove it too. Today, the measure of a newspaper’s success is precisely its number of digital subscribers. It represents the heart of its turnover. And that’s true everywhere. For example, the French newspaper The world, which is doing wonderfully, has 500,000 subscribers. More than 80% of them are in digital format.
My favorite case study
It’s easy to forget, but 10 years ago the washington post was on the brink of a financial abyss. Its status as an icon and its scoops of yesteryear have not been able to save the newspaper from questionable management, at the dawn of new consumer realities. In 2013, the WaPo recruited Marty Baron as editor, hoping he could revive the paper. It was healthy to believe that Baron was equipped to do so, he who had known success at the head of the direction of the Miami Heraldthen to that of Boston Globe. But Marty Baron’s experience and skill alone are not the lifeline that saved the washington post. A few months after Baron took office, Jeff Bezos bought the newspaper. The Amazon founder and space cowboy then brought a new vision to it and pumped US$250 million into it. Before the arrival of Marty Baron and Jeff Bezos, the washington post had 42,000 digital subscriptions. Today, it is at 2.7 million, just behind the wall street journaland behind the New York Times, which is top of the class across the world, with 8.4 million online subscribers.
THE Los Angeles Times also experienced difficult times, until its acquisition in 2018 by billionaire Patrick Soon-Shiong. Soon-Shiong injected 100 million US dollars into the newspaper.
It is perhaps with these examples in mind that Montrealer Mitch Garber recently made beacon calls to the Postmedia group, owner of the Montreal Gazette and more than 130 other media titles, including the National Post and the Vancouver Sun. Postmedia did not respond to Mitch Garber’s proposal. But last week, the group set up an advisory committee made up of 11 community and business leaders from Montreal to suggest rescue strategies.
The billionaire + newspaper formula can work. THE washington post and the Los Angeles Times are just two examples. It is a marriage that can succeed especially if there is no editorial interference from the person who keeps the checkbook.
Another condition for success is to remember that news is a public service and does not have to be profitable, even if it can. In an interview more than 20 years ago, the late Canadian journalist Peter Jennings recalled that the hardest thing that ever happened to television news was that it started making money.
The advantage of the billionaire newspaper owner is that he or she has other profitable holdings. In the case of Jeff Bezos, it is among others Amazon, Blue Origin and perhaps soon the Commanders, the Washington football team. For Patrick Soon-Shiong, who is a surgeon, it’s pharmaceuticals and part of the Lakers, the Los Angeles basketball team.
They can therefore, for the time being, content themselves with profits in their respective newspapers, without necessarily demanding profits.
There is a civic responsibility to protect local media and a free press. The Bezos and Soon-Shiong of this world seem to understand this, and if the acquisition of newspapers also represents hunting trophies for them, does it really matter?
It has often been said, with good reason, that you can judge a country by looking at how it treats its elders. I think we can also judge him by his treatment of his journalists and his press. Examples of the dangers of a limited press are many and we need not look far to see them. How lucky, what a privilege we have to have access to free media. You shouldn’t lose any. Democracy dies in obscurity. It’s true and it’s the motto of the washington post. Let’s keep more lights on (and long live the Montreal Gazette).