Vocal Voices

It looks as though the beginning of the end is well under way for newsprint. The Mirror and Express have been badly hit, but there is almost a 10 point drop across the board. Regional titles have been particularly badly hit. If the slide continues we could see a wholesale collapse within five years or so.

I have not bought a newspaper for many years, and for a couple of reasons. I generally do not identify with many of their political leanings, and I see no point in forking out for only a few pages of news. I am not the slightest bit interested in the latest celebrity fad diet or what upcoming fashions will be in store for Autumn, and I suspect that I am not alone.

Unfortunately for the press the world has turned and digital is the new kid on the block. Most of the bigger titles already have an online presence, making money from them is the hard part. If the print section dies will they die too?

Funnily enough, we've gone the other way and started taking a newspaper!

Our local supermarket is Waitrose and their loyalty account gives you a free daily newspaper of your choice if you've spent a minimum £10 in the store. So, rather than one big weekly shop of £80 or so, as a retired bird (!), I do 5 or 6 daily shops of £15 each and pick up The Times, which we think is the most balanced main-stream newspaper. We do the crossword for a bit of mental exercise (the basic one, not the cryptic ) and the general news / sports/ entertainments coverage is interesting and pretty unbiased. The columnists and comment / editorial columns are a tad pro-Remain for my liking, but not overly so, and there's nothing to get too worked up about, although Mrs O hates Matthew Parris with the same intensity that I hate .. well .. most politicians.

I no longer look for news online. If it's free-to-view, like the Daily Mail, it's way too politically biased. If it's more middle-of-the-line, it's usually behind a paywall and I'm certainly not subscribing, especially to be bombarded with adverts.

We don't buy the regional paper (Western Gazette) because there's plenty of free advertising papers that also provide local news (that excellent and longstanding institution, the weekly Blackmore Vale Magazine, and the monthly Gillingham & Shaftesbury News which is the new kid on the block). It wouldn't surprise me if the Western Gazette wasn't a casualty before too long.

I generally do not identify with many of their political leanings …...

I will occasionally look at the Biased Broadcasting Corporation online, but I cannot watch one of their news broadcasts on TV, national or local, without suffering a burst blood vessel. For example, is it simply not possible for them to make any outside broadcast about Brexit without those pilchards in the background waving a bleddy EU flag? And the ITV News is just a joke, the media equivalent of the Sun.

I get most news online, but from a variety of sources such a BBC, SKY, ITN, AP, Reuters, RT, Al Jazz, Wash Post, NYT, and I do that to get different viewpoints for the same subject.

Ossie, I cannot watch the BBC news any more without tearing my hair out; their agendas are so blatant

I did wonder what the hell the Mirror group were doing buying the Express. Their views are poles apart. I have noticed that Express stories now start out with the usual line and finish up presenting a much more Mirror style opinion.

I have taken to reading about the first 1/4 of An Express article and even then it's a bit light for any kind of serious information.

I've used the google news portal news.google.co.uk for a long time now and I use the ability to pull up all real time news on a subject to drill a bit deeper. I ignore the "entertainment" sections, most of the sport as I really can't be bothered with football. As the Guardian is not paywalled it has a very high bias there but I do read Guardian climate articles as they are some of the best in the business for reporting it.

When I was flying before the financial crisis the FT was always available somewhere for fee and I used to read the Friday and weekend versions. There are some extremely interesting points of view in the FT and I like reading them.

The day of the press is, however, in demise. The young have no interest in it, if it didn't happen 30 seconds ago they don't want to know. They are becoming like goldfish.

I've started reading the NYT online, but it only allows me a certain number of articles per month before I hit a paywall - and I have no intention of paying. I've noticed quite a few of the US sites are unavailable to view in EU countries!

Otherwise I read the Guardian online, via Facebook Gloucestershire Live for local news.

I do buy the MoS still (I'm not proud of myself ) for the YOU magazine, which is excellent, and the puzzle pages

I get the Telegraph and ocassionally the i paper.

I honestly think that when it comes to politics in the UK, there is no such thing as honest and unbiased reporting. Every paper and every tv channel is pushing their own side, their own agenda.

And as newspaper sales fall, their ability to influence is reduced, which makes it even more vital for the ruling classes, the politicians, the civil servants, the quangocrats, to be able to control the news.

Hence the crackdown on social media and the web.

Kaz, there have been a spate of sites locking EU citizens out of the US. This is mainly due to the GDPR regulation.

From what I can see, with what I'm doing at work, this is only the beginning.