Even in the digital era, the newspaper remains critical

A friend had just rung me very early in the morning that there was some good news in The New Times. To be in the know, I hurriedly headed to town arriving a few minutes later and waited to grab the paper at the earliest opportunity. Looking for the newspaper vender was the next thing before settling into my office. Five, ten to thirty minutes no vendor was in sight. I made several strides crisscrossing the road networks with hope of bumping into one of these youths selling The New Times but in vain. The next option was to drive to the central roundabout in downtown Kigali. Upon arriving, four of the vendors came all graving for my coin. It puzzled me as I had a fresh memory of my morning frustrations. I called back my friend, who had earlier informed me about the news to let him know that I had the copy of The New Times. He wondered why it took me that long to find one, but I declined to recite my ordeal and held the story for another day. The aftermath was my deep reflection on the position of the print media in today’s society. In the old days, newspapers and print media in general used to be the heartbeat of readers who wanted to get in touch with current affairs. I remember back then, nothing more than newspapers existed; the paper was as cutting edge when everybody relied on its street urchin to find out what was new in the world. However, it is becoming apparent that digitalisation has installed a reverse gear where many of us no longer have taste for the Newspaper instead they prefer reading all the stories online. It has been argued that anybody who says they can predict the future of newspapers is either a liar or a fool. With the falling figures in circulation for newspapers, there is no shortage of Jeremiahs, particularly from ‘wilder shores of digital evangelisation, who confidently predict that the last printed newspaper will be safely buried within less than 15 years!’ Like my friend who had read the online The New Times publication on his handset in the night even before the first print out was released, most of people are shying away from purchasing the newspapers. It might be one of the reasons why the vendors are concentrating on one side of the city where they feel those having interest in buying newspapers pass by. They find very little business in the centre of the city; because everyone is busy getting the same content from their handheld gadgets. It is a reality that we are turning our back to the newspaper and opting to have news on our smart phones, tabs and so on. Nevertheless, by any angle, the print newspaper is still a better product than the online news experience you will find, in terms of depth of enjoyment of articles and overall product satisfaction. I know there are many who may not buy this argument; however, experts say that reading a newspaper is vastly superior, in terms of neuroscience of the reading brain, compared to reading off screens. New inventions do make our lives easier in many ways, but they can also cause worries and troubles – both actual and perceived. For instance, reading from screens is attributed to making one read slower, learns less deeply, remember less and sleeps worse. This is because of the destructions that come along when one is glued onto the news page and leading to consumption of other junk news. Regarding the comfort of eyes, it is more comfortable to read from the paper since computer screens may make eyes tired. Newspapers directly contribute towards nurturing the much-needed reading culture which is a perennial problem in our society. Picking one per day would greatly help in restoring this generation’s reading habit which has always been termed as falling below the par. On the economic front, the online newspaper kills print in terms of classified ads. Subscription revenues are also lost when people just read newspapers online for free. It will be extremely difficult to make up for the revenue losses newspapers have already experienced. The tenders, bids and auctioning advertisements never appear online posing another setback. Above all, when newspapers close, journalists with decades of experience are being laid off. A newspaper is everlasting and unchanging, whereas articles can be hidden away on an online website in a matter of a few days. Not only can you hold a newspaper in your hand when you first get it, you can also save it back to look at any time. With other many uncounted benefits, the newspaper still occupies a crucial position as much as the technological tsunami is trying to sweep it away. Let us grab one every morning, read and keep in stock on the shelves of our home libraries! oscar_kim2000@yahoo.co.uk

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Even in the digital era, the newspaper remains critical