7.3.09
Weekend Cultural Highlights
July 3-5, 2009
6.25.09
Weekend Cultural Highlights
June 26-July 1
6.20.09
The return of Jew-hatred, now disguised as anti-Zionism
by Walter Reich in the Baltimore Sun
6.19.09
Weekend Cultural Highlights
June 19-25
6.17.09
Rogovoy to headline Klezmer program
at Hevreh, Tuesday, June 23, 7:30 pm
6.16.09
Remembering Joel Librizzi
Late great Berkshire Eagle photographer and personality
6.13.09
Sol LeWitt's System explained
from the Wall Street Journal
6.11.09
Weekend Cultural Highlights, June 12-14
Your guide to the top events
6.4.09
Weekend Cultural Highlights
June 5-7
9.27.08
A critic's dismissal raises questions of conflicts of interest
from the WALL STREET JOURNAL
6.1.09
[THEATER REVIEW] Shirley Valentine at Shakespeare and Company
Review by SETH ROGOVOY of BERKSHIRE LIVING Magzine
5.31.09
[MUSIC REVIEW] Close Encounters with Felix Mendelssohn and Eduard Franck
Review by SETH ROGOVOY of BERKSHIRE LIVING magazine
5.28.09
Weekend Cultural Highlights
May 29-31, 2009
5.24.09
[EAGLE WATCH] Blaming the victim
If Israel is to blame for Hamas, is U.S. to blame for Al Qaeda?
5.22.09
Merce Cunningham to be honored by Jacob's Pillow
[PRESS RELEASE] Legendary choreographer to receive cash award at June 20 gala
5.22.09
Merce Cunningham to be honored by Jacob's Pillow
[PRESS RELEASE] Legendary choreographer to receive cash award at June 20 gala
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(Eagle Watch #5) The end of a free press
6/2/05
No sooner than we began posting links to various Berkshire Eagle articles and letters to the editor, in the hopes of provoking critical discussion of the local media (and indeed, very quickly conversations began, as you can see from the various comments visitors have posted this past week), did the Eagle redesign its website (more on that atrocity in coming days and weeks), including ripping down all of its archival material. So now those links we posted to old articles and letters are dead, and if you want to find them (good luck trying to find them using the Eagle's search engine, because I tried and it doesn't work), you'll have to pay $3 per hit -- that's right -- it'll cost you $3 to read some lousy article, review, or letter to the editor. But you have to pay BEFOREHAND, so buyer beware!
Chalk another one up for the bottom line, and another down for the glories of the free exchange of ideas. Ideas, it seems, will cost a pretty penny if they run in the Eagle. So much for the free press.
If a publication wanted to increase revenue via the web, wouldn't it make more sense to facilitate the placement of classified (and display) advertising. Or offer value added services to their advertisers?
It has always been my understanding the newspapers sold the paper to cover the distribution/printing costs, and that the advertisers were the revenue source. Moreover, the advertiser's value proposition was that the newspaper had an audience, and that was what an insertion fee was predicated upon.
Now, at least in the Eagle's case, the model seems to be to charge for information, and that is a failed model. It is a failure as a business model when the web has made ALL information available ALL the time for essentially NO cost. It is a dereliction of duty as a cultural model, when the unique function of a newspaper (or any editorially selected informational source) is to make judgments as to relevance, and to organize and facilitate the access to information.
Small wonder that as newspapers become conglomerated corporate holdings (Dinosaurs) the little mouse driven web renders them redundant.
dlm
6/3/2005
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