Newspapers are dying. That's old news. The novelty is that in California it is possible that they receive some life support from the state government.
State legislation is in the works that would force the largest internet platforms, like Google, to pony up money to help save journalism. After all, these platforms are the main villains in the downfall of so many media outlets.
It is not just newspapers that are in dangerous decline. These are largely news reports, print, broadcast and even digital.
In financial peril is the profession of gathering factual information that citizens need to hold their elected representatives and governments accountable, in Washington, Sacramento and every small city and town.
Strong journalism is the essential component of a healthy democracy. Weak journalism leads to a sick democracy.
Here is a clear example of what is happening today as misinformation fills the communications void left by the weakening of factual journalism:
Millions of Americans actually believe Donald Trump's lies that the 2020 election was stolen from him. There is no credible evidence of that poor loser's lie. But Trump supporters ignore the declining objective media and reaffirm their beliefs in echo chambers like Fox News.
Most political and government writers, by nature, are driven by the desire to break through the bull and provide the public with clear facts written in an understandable manner. If there is an agenda, it is not ideological. It is to appear on the main page or at the top of the website.
But newspaper journalism is a profession in decline because it has traditionally been funded primarily by advertising. This is collapsing because of the Internet.
Basically, large Internet platforms devour media products, work without paying for it, and build their own advertising programs around the stolen articles. Or they just copy the information and create their own posts. This is the terrifying future of AI.
Newspaper advertising has dried up. And increasingly, due to the actions of the platforms, revenue is not being replaced by ads on the Internet.
Additionally, when you go to Google to buy a pair of shoes online, the platform collects your data and sells it to other shoe companies. You'll soon be inundated with shoe ads online. And shoe companies see no reason to run ads in a newspaper or on local television.
Advertising money to pay journalists' salaries has been flowing for years. About two-thirds of California journalists have lost their jobs in the past two decades. More than 100 Times newsroom employees were laid off in January.
Admittedly, some lawmakers are trying to stand up to the powerful platforms and throw a lifeline to the media.
Assemblywoman Buffy Wicks (D-Oakland) is pushing a bill, AB 886, similar to laws enacted in Australia and Canada. It would require large platforms to pay media outlets for their products. Fees would be set through arbitration. Media outlets would be required to spend at least 70% of the money on reporters.
The bill passed the Assembly last year but has not passed the Senate.
Key lawmakers agreed to pass something this summer, but they haven't decided what. They are trying to weave legislation that would achieve a difficult two-thirds legislative vote, be acceptable to the big platforms and get Gov. Gavin Newsom's signature. The governor has remained silent.
The quartet consists of Wicks, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Tom Umberg (D-Orange), new Senate Majority Leader Mike McGuire (D-Healdsburg), and Sen. Steve Glazer (D-Orinda). , author of a second bill to rescue journalism.
“We've experienced newsroom emptying on epic proportions, and that has significantly eroded government oversight,” says Glazer, a former political press secretary.
I asked the veteran politician if he had noticed a decline in coverage of the state Capitol. “Absolutely,” he replied. “There are great journalists. But the volume of actions taking place at the Capitol that receive no scrutiny is extraordinary.”
Over the past two decades, the size of the Capitol press corps (and in the Times office) has shrunk by two-thirds.
Glazer's bill, SB 1327, would impose a “data mining mitigation fee” (a sales tax) on platforms that make more than $2.5 billion annually from advertising aimed at Californians. It would catch Google, Amazon and Meta and generate a billion dollars a year.
Forty percent would go to schools, a measure that helps build political support for the bill.
Half ($500 million) would provide tax credits for journalists' salaries. The credits would range from 30% of the salaries of full-time news employees at The Times and other mid-sized and large newspapers, and up to 55% for new hires at small newspapers with a maximum of five employees.
I called the editor of the small Ojai Valley News, a print weekly with two full-time reporters and four part-time employees.
“There really needs to be something to rescue independent newspapers,” says editor Laura Rearwin Ward. “If done right, it could provide better salaries for journalists. I don't see why journalists should live in poverty. This company cannot afford to pay them a fair wage. “They do it for love.”
I also called the press officer at the other end of the journalism spectrum: Chris Argentieri, president and chief operating officer of the LA Times, which has a staff of about 400 people.
“We produce a lot of very important intellectual property that circulates around the world,” Argentieri told me. “It doesn't make sense that a company can keep our product and not compensate us for it.”
He added that news organizations are not big enough to deal with powerful platforms and that the platforms will not negotiate. “The government is the only entity that can take on Google,” she says.
I asked him about the future of newspapers. Its formula: a good product that people will buy, digital subscriptions, philanthropic aid and public sector support.
The two bills pending in the Legislature will probably (hopefully) be merged in some way.
Unless the government stands up to today's robber barons, it could be “-30-” for much of the legitimate news. That's the old news sign that means “the end.”
