Supporting your local newspaper

We are subscribers to the local paper (the Daily Camera).  It’s not perfect (and there are of course online subscription options), but the experience of reading newspaper is different than the experience of reading online.  They both have strengths.

Online:

• read from anywhere: anywhere that has an internet connection, of course
• searchability: you can search for a particular word within an article or a specific article within an edition
• shareability: super simple to pass on an article that you think a friend would enjoy via email, text, etc

Offline/paper:

• discoverability: often you’ll discover stories that you didn’t know you needed to read
• focus: when you’re reading the paper, you aren’t distracted by any notifications or other applications
• browseability: you can easily switch between sections and discover related articles
• shareability: when you read an article you like, you can point it out to a family member and they can immediately read it if they like

There’s also a comforting ritual about it–wandering out to the driveway every morning and enjoying the early morning across the seasons, younger family members seeking out the funnies, folding the newspaper and reading it on the couch.

Supporting local news organizations is much like supporting local shops or local farms. In all of these cases, you’re trading efficiency for resiliency (the centralized solution is in general more efficient, but concentration means more chokepoints).  If you don’t support local options, eventually they won’t be available. If that’s OK with you, that’s fine, but it’s not OK with me.