Dear NOW Magazine - You're Dead (And It's About Time)

I'm obviously not breaking any new ground by saying this, but print is dead.  Not kind of dead.  Not "well I still like the feel of paper in my hands once in a while but I do most of my news reading online" dead.  But totally, fully, one hundred per cent deceased.  Print is like the hooker in that asshole senator's room in Godfather Part II - not only dead, but without family or friends.  It will not be missed by anyone once it's actually out of sight.  Completely irrelevant as an entity.

Yesterday, NOW Magazine printed a letter to the editor I wrote (or didn't even really write, it was actually a comment on one of their stories that they turned into a letter to the editor).  This is what it said:

Rob Ford hasn’t denied that the incident in the alleged crack video ever happened (NOW, May 24). He only denied having seen the video, with a line tossed in about the video maybe not existing at all. Which might mean he’s already bought it – or feels safe enough assuming it won’t come out.
Andrew Ryan Fox 

Here's the thing - this comment was written last Friday, shortly after Rob Ford's first press conference.  Well it was six days later when the issue was printed and went up online.  In those six days like 72,000 things happened with this story.  Printing a letter about whether or not he properly denied smoking crack on the day when the dailies were screaming about coverups and resignations is like printing a letter about the Leafs winning Game 2 the day after they lose Game 7.  The shit is old news.  Played out.

So why do they bother?  I mean, I appreciate that they decided to print something I'd written.  And obviously I like NOW enough to read it and comment on its stories and write to it every now and then.  But a weekly paper trying to cover breaking news in a big city is always going to be a million years behind the times on just about everything.  Even dailies can't keep up, which is why they all update to their web sites throughout the day when something happens (as NOW and other weeklies do as well).  But then the question is, why do they bother with their print editions?  I know everyone has this nostalgic thing about the good old days of the newspaper business and the romance of the printed word and all that bullshit.  But consider these three points:

1. Newspapers as physical objects are incredibly wasteful.  Really think about the idea that with all of the daily newspapers in the world, HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of trees are being cut down every day for things that are literally only supposed to last for 24 hours.  At least books stick around.  Newspapers are by definition ephemeral.  You think the fact it has that little "Printed On Recycled Paper" disclaimer means anything?  Then I suggest you take a trip up to northern Ontario, find a caribou, and ask him whether he thinks the small percentage of newspapers around the world that use recycled paper are solving the problem.  He probably won't answer though, because he's too busy trying to find somewhere to live.  (Also, he's a caribou.)
2. Newspapers make a huge mess.  Everywhere.  On the street.  On buses and subways.  In your garage.  Wherever the fuck they are, they just sit there, attracting rats who use them as nests, or blow around all over the place.  The benefits of having cheap paper available to toilet train puppies or use as makeshift umbrellas do no outweigh the detriment of detritus floating all over the place.
3. There are literally zero things that a printed newspaper can do that your smartphone or tablet or laptop can't do a zillion times better.  Portability, readability, variety, streamlining, cross-referencing, sharing, not getting your fingers all black and inky with newsprint... all of these things are improved in digital form.  Maybe even as recently as five years ago there were lots of people in Toronto that didn't have access to that kind of technology.  But nearly everyone does now.  And the few who don't aren't enough to make an entire, wasteful, messy, redundant, irrelevant industry necessary.  Yes, there are people in countries around the world who rely on printed paper to keep them informed and to communicate with each other.  People who really can't afford an iPhone or a Galaxy tablet.  But most of us here can.  So at the very least, those of us privileged enough to live in this part of the world should get on with it already.

So yeah, cry over the carcass of the print newspaper industry if you want.  But then dig a hole and bury it and move on with your life.  Technology changes, media evolves, and clinging to some romantic notion of the past is pointless, because it's all going this way anyway.  Sooner or later, print newspapers will disappear completely.  Let them go already.

Oh, and NOW Magazine, a word of advice - at least print your letters on your Web site when they're received.  There's no excuse for being behind the curve when you have the means, at least digitally, not to be.  Also you make me look like a moron putting an out of date letter with my name on it on your site.  Get with the program.

UPDATE: A couple of people have pointed out something that maybe I wasn't clear about.  I'm only talking about daily and weekly newspapers.  Books are still awesome.  Even magazines that do in depth reporting or specialty writing that isn't time sensitive are great.  I'm specifically referring to printed media that is almost instantly disposable.  It's no longer necessary.