Economic News

Alaska Community Radio Trouble

by


Article in Poynter by Liam Scott, 1028/25

Headline:  “An Alaska station connects communities across hundreds of miles. Now it’s fighting to survive.”

Subhead:  “Federal funding cuts have left KOTZ, the only local news source for much of northwest Alaska, on the brink of closure”

“In the remote Arctic town of Kotzebue, Alaska, some residents still talk about the Dairy Queen that closed several years ago. They also talk about what’s at risk of closing next: the region’s lone radio station.

“Since 1973, KOTZ has delivered the news to Kotzebue, population 3,102, and several other small, sparse villages that collectively are home to about the same number of people. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.poynter.org/business-work/2025/alaska-radio-station-kotz-faces-funding-crisis/

 

Fewer Local News Outlets

by


Article in Poynter by Angela Fu, 10/20/25

Headline: “An alarming number of independent publishers and small chains closed papers last year, new Medill study finds”

Subhead:  “The United States has lost nearly 3,500 newspapers and more than 270,000 newspaper jobs since 2005, the report found”

“For years, the U.S. has lost more than two newspapers per week on average, thanks, in part, to growing consolidation. But this past year, the majority of closures were papers belonging to smaller chains and independent owners, according to a new report from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism.

“Medill’s 2025 State of Local News report tracked 136 newspaper closures over the past year, up from 130 last year. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.poynter.org/business-work/2025/medill-report-local-news-closures-independent-papers-news-deserts/

The Talking-Rings Took Over

by

(From The Time Machine, 1960)

Article in The Washington Post by George Will. 10/17/25

Headline: “What killed print media — and what died with it”

“The waning of newsprint is about cultural changes more momentous than digital publishing’s arrival.”

“. . .Mir [a Canadian media ecologist] says ‘the last newspaper generation’ was born in the early 1980s. It came of age as the internet did. Soon journalism stopped being about informing people to make them citizens, and began to be about making them agitated.

“The new business model depends on polarization, amplifying readers’ irritations and frustrations. ‘A newspaper,’ wrote Vladimir Lenin, ‘is not only a collective propagandist and a collective agitator, but also a collective organiser.’

“ ‘Americans,’ Mir says, ‘consume media 12 hours per day. . .”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2025/10/17/trump-internet-news-media-newspapers/

Bag of Cash? – Nothing Wrong Here

by


Article in The New Republic by Malcolm Ferguson, 10/14/25

Headline:  “Trump Lashes Out at ABC Reporter After Disastrous Vance Interview”

Subhead:  “Donald Trump refused to take a question from an ABC reporter in his meeting with Argentine President Javier Milei.”

“President Trump refused to answer a question from an ABC reporter at his sitdown with Argentine President Javier Milei on Tuesday, citing host George Stephanopoulos’s embarrassment of Vice President JD Vance on Sunday. . .”

“Stephanopoulos didn’t “do” anything to Vance—he simply called him out on his B.S. regarding the $50,000 cash bribe the FBI caught current White House border czar Tom Homan accepting in a sting operation in 2024. Vance and the Trump administration continue to state that Homan committed no crime while being unable to say where the $50,000 went. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://newrepublic.com/post/201760/trump-refuses-answer-abc-reporter-jd-vance-interview

Newspaper Subscriber Woes

by


Article in Columbia Journalism Review by Riddhi Setty, 10/14/25

Headline:  “Postal Service Delays Are Making the Already Tight Newspaper Business Even Harder”

Subhead:  “Subscribers report delays of as long as two months.”

“In late September, a man walked into the office of Jill Friesz, the owner of a newspaper publishing company in North Dakota, in a rage. ‘He was telling me he was tired of my excuses and that he may as well just quit subscribing to the paper,’ said Friesz, whose company, GS Publishing, operates seven weekly newspapers across the southwestern part of the state. . .”

“The problem, according to Friesz and a half dozen other newspaper publishers, editors, and trade association members who spoke to CJR, is significant delays by the US Postal Service, leading to weekly papers arriving at the homes of subscribers as late as nine weeks. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.cjr.org/analysis/postal-service-delays-newspapers.php

Media Fading Away?

by


Article in Axios by Sara Fisher, 10/7/25

Headline: “Job cuts in news stabilize while broader media industry struggles”

“News media job cuts are more tempered so far this year, despite a few outlier organizations hit by public funding cuts and looming layoffs tied to consolidation.

“Why it matters: 2024 was a particularly brutal year for the news industry, as outlets raced to cut positions in an attempt to offset a weak ad market and get ahead of business disruptions from artificial intelligence. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.axios.com/2025/10/07/news-media-job-losses

In the Shredder?

by


Article in Daily Beast by Janna Brancolini, 10/6/25

Headline:  “Murdoch Paper Shreds Trump’s ‘Self-Destructive’ Fiasco”

“Rupert Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal blasted President Donald Trump’s tariff policy as “self-destructive folly” in response to plans to bail out farmers whose markets the administration has destroyed.

“Trump is considering a $10 billion relief package for soybean farmers, who have seen their sales plummet, thanks to the president’s trade war with China, which has hit American soybeans with a 23-percent import tax. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.thedailybeast.com/rupert-murdoch-paper-shreds-donald-trumps-self-destructive-tariff-fiasco/

 

Media Monopolies?

by


Article in The New York Times, 9/11/25

Headline: “Paramount Plans Bid for Warner Bros. Discovery”

Subhead: “Any deal would further reshape the media industry, putting CBS News, CNN and two major movie studios under the same corporate umbrella.”

“. . .A merger of the two Hollywood giants would reshape the media industry, putting some of the most renowned news and entertainment brands under the same roof. It would unite two of the biggest movie studios and two of the most influential news networks, CBS News and CNN. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/11/business/media/paramount-warner-bros-discovery-bid.html

First Newspapers, Now Local TV

by


Article in Poynter by Rick Edmonds, 9/2/25

Headline:  “Inescapable technology changes and a migrating audience have local broadcast news in trouble”

Subhead: “For years, local TV looked steady while newspapers flailed. Now the business model creaks, and the challenges feel uncomfortably familiar.”

“The scenario is familiar to any journalist who has worked at a newspaper in the last 15 years. The audience is moving away from the profitable old platform to a hot, new one. The outlet must adapt or at least try to. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.poynter.org/business-work/2025/is-business-broadcast-journalism-in-trouble/

Did Media Panic?

by


Article in Mediaite by Ahmad Austin Jr., 8/28/25

Headline:  “CNBC Analyst Rips Media’s Trump Panic After Latest Jobs Report Turns Out Good: ‘Not Sending Any Smoke Signals’ “

“CNBC Analyst Rips Media’s Trump Panic After Latest Jobs Report Turns Out Good: ‘Not Sending Any Smoke Signals’ . . .”

“At the end of his report, Santelli noted how the drama surrounding President Donald Trump’s feud with the Federal Reserve — despite all the media attention — has had little impact on the economy itself. . .”

Read the ull article at:

https://www.mediaite.com/media/tv/cnbc-analyst-rips-medias-trump-panic-after-latest-jobs-report-turns-out-good-not-sending-any-smoke-signals/