The long term future of the newspaper industry is not looking good- and that’s a bit of an understatement. Between 2007 and 2009, the UK newspaper publishing market declined by 21%. Quite simply, the industry cannot continue in its current guise.

Times have changed and media has moved on. Newspapers must evolve, find their idenity in the multi-platorm media age- or die. Simple Darwinist theory.

At least that was the view amongst some of the blur Group staff yesterday morning. We’ve noted Rupert Murdoch’s attempts to direct the newspaper industry towards paid content and we’re not too convinced that’s it’s the right approach at present. Losing 1.2 million of The Times’ online audience (90% of the readership prior to going subscription-only) doesn’t sound too healthy.

The problem lies in convincing readers to pay for content they were once able to receive for free. And the danger of converting to subscription-only models will be from other forms of media who will willingly cater for the deserters.

It’s okay to enforce paid-for content on your readers if you’re the Financial Times or Wall Street Journal- the editorial is niche, and highly valued in the financial sector. But news is news. It’s now everywhere- and former Times Online readers know they can still find high quality content from many other news groups who do not belong to News International.

The internet has changed the dynamic of journalism- readers can access a lot of the technology and information that the media organisations use themselves. 

We’ve previously debated the merits of ‘Crowdsourced Journalism’ or a larger growth of citizen journalism- and that’s certainly one form of reinvigorating participation- but this alone will not change an entire industry mindset. Which is why we were very interested to stumble upon Bill Mitchell’s 10 ways to reinvent journalism. 

In short- the readership needs to be re-engaged. Communication lines need to be established between the papers and their audience. The breadth of news organisations need to be scaled down (perhaps good news for Murdoch after all). Collaboration- both with fellow journalists and bloggers- must encourage participation. More independent thought.More experimentation. More authority.  And more trust between reader and writer. 

Only once the print media has re-established a relationship with a loyal audience can the paid-for model ever truly take off.