Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis for December 04, 2022

That’s one way to fight for the freedom of the press.

That’s one angry paper; it must not have any comics.

I guess Pig was afraid of being board! we can’t get a paper delivered in our remote neighborhood…

I’ve always wondered what they meant by “hard-hitting” journalism

Some local papers don’t have any investigative journalists. They just reprint stories from elsewhere.

That paper bats 300

I cancelled the local paper 8 months ago and I don’t miss it.

They keep saying to support the local newspaper but then they cut the paper editions for Monday and Tuesday. Then I got the bill for next year’s and they want $657 for 52 weeks. I changed it to just the Wednesday and Sunday papers for $345. I get emails every day for the online edition which is basically the paper I used to get in printed form. Most of it is only available online anymore.

Happy 141st Anniversary, Los Angeles Times! December 4, 1881.

You cannot force people to buy something that has gotten more expensive while becoming a LOT less useful (and smaller). Spouse still buys a e-subscription to one local paper, but I’m unimpressed. We used to get a not-quite-local paper for the crosswords (and news) but not even a crossword in the e-paper (of course).

There are papers for a number of nearby towns, but they have gotten less useful over the years. I cancelled my subscription to one of them. We get another one at work, and that will have to do.

The local ‘newspaper’ won’t even post the election results.The regional ‘newspaper’ is owned by USA Today, with the resulting idiocy and happy horseshit ‘stories’, and sports ‘news’ appearing on the front page.The ONLY major ‘newspapers’ that are NOT owned by USA Today are NO longer are distributed in this area due to the distance from their population centers, BUT they had become just as bad about treating sports events, specifically, the Cocaine Cowboys as front page ‘news’, as to make them unreadable.

The newspaper in the comic is, of course, correct. If we want quality in-depth reporting and true investigative journalism, as opposed to the “let’s just make stuff up & recite it as ‘fact’” crowd, we have to support it in a very real sense, and that means paying for it. So I subscribe to the NY Times. Regardless of what conservatives think, it is one of the premier newspapers in the world, and is pretty much taken as the sine qua non of American journalism. It used to be required daily reading for every US President, including the Republicans.

Our Seattle Times still has a good selection of comics, puzzles, and advice columns. We get the print edition though it has increased in price. The local news and sports are good though we have fewer reporters than we did a few years ago,

Did Rat mention, he is now the Editor of the local newspaper?

Save paper, save trees!

Interesting theme, but not a viable solution approach. New economic model is needed. My proposal is solution-oriented journalism, but either the idea is flawed or not funny.

Good Luck with that, though I’d never get my news from social media either.

Well, I don’t think they can figure out a way to suspend the law of supply and demand. The supply of content is now effectively infinite. People won’t pay for it for the same reason they won’t pay for leaves in November.

I think newspapers probably need to get rid of print entirely – which is enormously expensive – and figure out a way to make digital content profitable. Local ads for local stores and companies might be a good idea. That doesn’t seem to exist online in any convenient form.

The Count and Countess now refer to the local newspaper as a brochure.

The hard “hitting news” of the NY Times and Washington Post aren’t believable anymore so why bother to subscribe to the propaganda.

People don’t buy newspapers anymore because it’s better for the Earth and saves on trees.

Subscribe to your local paper; it’s important.

Newspapers, like most other media outlets, only watch over the government when Republicans are in power. When Democrats are in power, they brownnose them and turn a blind eye to their corruption.

I dropped my subscription to the local paper when they dropped the Arts section and went to 3 days a week, going to a central state-wide version. Currently it’s nearly all sports stats about which I care nothing. Lately they announced that they are no longer going to publish a newspaper at all, only the online version.

Ditto here. I miss going outside, getting the newspaper and sitting down with a cup of coffee to check out what happened the previous day. Now I use the internet to get the news. Not the same, for sure.

Of course he wants to promote people getting the paper-that’s how he gets paid! In Austin the paper is printed out of town in San Antonio so it is put to bed around 5 PM so there are no baseball scores-when it was printed in Austin you would get box scores for all games played in Eastern Time Zone and most games played in the Central Zone. Keeping delivery people is hard – my street is about 1/3 of a mile long with 40 houses on it-about 3 people get the paper-so he has to drive 1/3 of mile to deliver 3 papers.

I’ll subscribe as soon as they take all the “news” out of it. I much prefer the comics and Sudoku.

The last Denver newspaper does not watch over our government. It just prints what they say. No journalism here.

The news media should keep in mind that nobody elected them. They are self-appointed guardians. They can be the fourth estate, but only if people buy it. That said, people now prefer news from their “silo,” a walled-off area where no other opinions or viewpoints are tolerated. Now news outlets cater to the silos, i.e. liberal media, conservative media, and then completely crazy media.

I still pick up a paper once in a while – when I need packing material.

My local news paper is not yet that desperate. But I guess they will be soon.

Gannett bought our local paper years ago. They cut back the reporting and editorial staff to nearly zero. Now, they don’t cover any aspects of local government. Useless ad rag.

I keep my subscription to the nearest major city paper; however, I dropped my county paper after realizing that Gannett bought it and another local paper – and essentially ruined them both, especially the online subscription.

In Sacramento we get colored comics every day of the week. That’s a paper for the common man.

Sigh. I used to buy a Chicago paper (for Mike Royko’s column) and the two local dailies at the newsstand. What’s a “newsstand”? Now, there’s only one daily paper here, and it’s $2.00 on weekdays.

I subscribe to the on-line versions of both the Seattle Times and the NY Times. I can pick and choose which articles I want to read. I also do internet searches for other information from different sources (both liberal and conservative). The Seattle Times has a feature called “print replica” which allows me to see the actual print edition on-line. Just like reading a real paper but without the waste.

That paper’s will leave at least a line in Pig’s head.

For several years I subscribed to the closest major paper primarily for the comics and crossword (NYT one month delayed. Annoying for holiday themed puzzles) But they had increasing troubles with delivery and the entertainment section was often missing. So, I gave up.It is a failing business model, and no recovery is in sight.

Our paper can’t get a delivery person to do the job.

The local paper is garbage! They feature sports, sports and sports! POS!

We cancelled because we didn’t get our paper until noon or after several calls, when it used to be there when we woke up.

It seems as if real journalism does not exist any more. What ever happened to answering the “5 W’s and the Y” in the first paragraph. Now I’ll read a headline, but then have to dig 2/3 down the article to read the story.

(I actually know the answer, I just like answering the question in the hopes that if enough of us start pressuring the media companies and stop clicking on their “click-bait” they might actually go back to real journalism. Yeah, I know. And maybe someday pigs will sprout wings and start flying.)

I subscribe to the print edition of the Chicago Tribune and the digital of the Washington Post and the Guardian. And Time magazine.

well, if it’s hard-hitting…

You can cancel your subscription and they will stop delivering the paper. But, they will continue to charge your credit card.

The papers seemed to have stopped hiring proof readers or any writer who can actually construct a decent sentence.Where did all of the true journalists go? I understand that covering a story doesn’t equate with writing about it but still, it’s annoying to read something so poorly written.A few years ago I saw so many errors in an article that I cut it out and red marked them and mailed it to the newspaper.

He made some very persuasive points……

NEWSPAPERS LIKE OTHER BUSINESSES INCUR RISING COSTS OFFSET BY SUBSCRIPTIONS AND ADVERTISING. ITS A SHAME THAT WE ALL TURN TO E MEDIA. ITS A PROBLEM THAT LENDS ITSELF TO FALSE EMEDIA REPORTING. OLD SCHOOL PAPERS ARE A DISAPPEARING ACT. UNFORTUNATELY

It’s a dilemma for sure. Our local paper isn’t very good, but it had several features I hated to give up- local events calendar, local gardening advice, the police log, and of course, the comics.

I subscribe to the print edition of my local newspaper. The reason I do is because they are the only source of local news on the internet and without them there would be none and I wouldn’t know what is going on around me — local taxes, local politicians, local crime — things that affect me directly.

Our paper went to $85 a month, kept eliminating sections like business, eliminated some funnies, became mostly AP articles and USAToday. No wonder they lose subscribers.

If you ask me, PBS is a bit boring.

OUR paper’s price is now three dollars A PAPER with a QUARTER the comics! We are very likely to cancel.

I no longer subscribe to the local paper for a few reasons. First I don’t have the time to sit and read it. Second, by the time the paper is delivered it’s already old news. Third, it used to have extras like a TV guide, a magazine section etc. Those ended long ago, and printed TV guides are obsolete anyway. Fourth, my shopping habits have changed and I i longer use coupons enough to get the paper for them.

It used to be true that the local paper was the only place you could get stories about local issues. That ship sailed well over 10 years ago with 2, maybe 3, companies owning all the media — not just print — in every town across the nation. To make themselves richer, they cut the local papers for being too expensive, and got themselves a law passed that they can own more local media than before, leading to consolidations and buyouts and more cuts in local coverage.

I think this comic’s bat-wielding paper has it right, the local media should take their market back, by force if necessary.

Sadly, the reason I have never subscribed to our local newspaper is that the quality is abysmal. They can’t even spell their banner, headlines correctly. And I don’t live in a small town I live in a big city.

Rat should have answered the door.

The “hard-hitting journalism” line made me laugh.

I lived in DC for 20 years and subscribed to the Washington Post all that time. When I moved I took out a digital subscription I maintain to this day. But the local paper? No, I have to admit that I’m not interested.

My local paper is mostly propaganda, so I don’t feel bad for not subscribing.

We had a great newspaper until a far right nutjob bought it. Lost half the subscribers.A newspaper should be unbiased. He sold it at a loss and it’s going to take a long time before people trust it again.

It’s interesting to read what other people think about their local papers. It seems to all boil down to too left or too right, or poor quality. I do some genealogy work, and it’s sad to see how my local paper has declined. Like many others, mine has very little news now. Many full-page ads; photos of readers pets, flowers, and backyard squirrels; the current festival; and local restaurant reviews (which are always glowing). Major news articles are on page five. The local paper pleads for support, but delivers a low-quality product that isn’t worth the price. So what do they do? They lower the quality some more, increase the price, and beg for support.

I used to subscribed to papers and I get the happy news on the local paper and the other to get the news on our state, world, and national news. If the papers go, then this country will be in a deep pile of dog pooh!

We subscribe to our local paper because that’s how we find out what’s going on locally. Our reporters are what I would call true journalists because they tend to report both sides of an issue. That’s pretty rare nowadays.

I would consider subscribing IF they covered local news of import (not just HS sports) and the national “news” I can get 20 other places.

Philadelphia has—in theory—two newspapers—the “Inquirer” and the “Daily News”.The “Inquirer” has always prided itself on being founded in the 18th century, and for racking multiple journalism awards in the 1970s.

The “Daily News” was the annoying little brother that went after local political corruption.

Nowadays, the “Daily News” is "An Edition of the “Inquirer”.

The “Daily News” no longer prints letters to the editor, TV schedules, or even sports schedules in a sports-crazy city.

And the “Inquirer” now sells itself as a provider of money-saving coupons.

How the mighty have fallen.

Talk about “driving a hard bargain”.

I thought I’d be the last man living to get a newspaper every day. That changed about 4 years ago when it became impossible to get it delivered with any degree of certainty. Besides that, trying to keep from being charged for the non delivered paper was an exercise in multiple connections to wind up in Mumbai to a telephone operator there. No longer worth it.

I only get the Sunday edition of our local paper, mainly for the coupons, and crossword. And now, they’ve made the Sunday Parade “magazine” only available to on-line e-subscribers.

Never let a journo have a bashing ball bat when interviewing you! They are partial to violence, and don’t mind practicing it themselves!

Oh, so THAT’s what that phrase means!

My local paper only even has a full edition like three days a week now.

Rat: It’s probably cheaper than toilet paper.

Newspaper I worked for in the 80s & 90s got sold off to some conglomerate. The offices and printing is 90 miles away (no local presence at all) and our old production facility is mostly torn down now.

Aside from NY TIMES and WASHINGTON POST,papers just run the wire services.I’m amazed ClarkKent&Lois Lane aren’t on unemployment by now.

George Santos