COLUMBIA JOURNALISM REVIEW – 24/04/2020
Mathew Ingram
If it wasn’t already obvious that the media industry was in dire straits before the coronavirus came along, it has become abundantly obvious now. Every day, it seems, news outlets large and small are announcing waves of furloughs, salary cuts, and layoffs for significant numbers of their employees—the Los Angeles Times, Tribune Publishing, Conde Nast, BuzzFeed, McClatchy (which had already filed for bankruptcy before the pandemic), even Fox Corp. have all implemented cuts. Protocol, a tech news startup launched by the owners of Politico, in February, just laid off almost half its newsroom. Some local newspapers have shut down completely and may not be able to return once the economy picks up. What can be done about this? Should there be a government bailout? Should digital platforms like Google and Facebook be forced to subsidize a public fund for media? To hear some answers, CJR convened a virtual panel on Galley, our discussion platform.