Trees vs Sprouts
Solid article on Mashable discussing the future of Newspapers/News. Just like so many other legacy business models out there today, the newspaper industry is struggling to respond to the changed environment it now operates in.
Understanding how these businesses do and don’t respond never gets boring to me because regardless of the business, industry etc. evolving a legacy business model involves addressing many fundamentally consistent challenges - culture change, success:fear ratios, cost cutting vs investing in innovation etc.
It will be fascinating to see how HBS and others capture where we’ve been and where we end up as this painful and industry agnostic evolution unfolds…
http://mashable.com/2010/06/22/newspapers-future/
“Of course, to truly fill the gaps of lost coverage, it will take time. It isn’t going to happen overnight. Perhaps a good analogy is to think of it like a forest, McLellan said. The tall trees are old journalism (newspapers), which will eventually wither and die. But slowly all around us, we’re beginning to see “sprouts” that are quickly growing and starting to get more light (as the tall trees wither around them). That light is coming from recognition that the work they are doing is important and valuable.”
