OK, I have an admission to make: I love newspapers. Yes, the kind where the ink gets all over your hands. I trace my affinity with newspapers back to my first job; the newspaper route that I managed between the ages of 12 and 14. I would get home from school, pick up the newspapers and run house to house to deliver my 40 papers so I could get to the baseball field or basketball court before sides were chosen. I had my first taste of responsibility (and my first source of income) and remember the number of folks who would be standing by the door anxious to read the evening edition of the Bergen Record.
In case you haven't heard, newspapers are a dying business. Here is an article in this month's Atlantic Monthly which will get you plenty depressed if you are a newspaper fan. What made me think of this? It was while I was picking up my Monday Wall Street Journal this morning off our doorstep that it struck me. The paper seemed different, very different to me as I picked it up outside our door. It was thin, I mean really thin. 16 pages to Section A, 8 pages to Section B and 6 pages in Section C. Only one advertisement in Section C (ETFs from State Street). The end may be closer than I expected. I better get used to reading the on-line version. I will miss that smudgy ink though!