Stan Geiger

Bob Woodward's Comment

It was a few days back, on one of those dumbass pundit shows. I think it was Chris Matthews in this instance. Anyway, the topic for discussion was newspapers and their financial problems. Bob Woodward reminisced about his days at the Washington Post and Watergate.

He said that at one point ad revenue for the paper was down $7 million. In today's bucks, that's likely something between $30 million and $40 million. The reason for the drop-off was local car dealers being upset over Watergate reporting. Woodward referred to the owner saying that it was a good thing the paper could afford the hit.

It is no longer so in the media biz.

I was watching a little poker playing on TV not long ago. One of the players aimed a little jibber-jabber at Gabe Kaplan of Welcome Back Kotter fame. Kaplan was asked about ratings. He said Kotter generally rated about 10th or so. But he added that meant a lot more back in the day---millions of viewers more.

Excellent point. Things are so spread out today, whether it's news or entertainment, whether you're talking about a broadsheet or a TV station, media entities can't afford to alienate advertisers. And I'd call that a bad thing.

If you take car ads, fast-food ads and drug-company ads off TV, what's left? Well, I guess you've still got casino ads, lottery ads and education ads. But that's about it.

Investigative reporting, real investigative reporting, is most probably dead. The entities that need to be investigated the most are the ones that have money. And the ones that have money can buy the media's loyalty.

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