Marc Andreessen- the man who invented the Web browser and the super brain behind Ning talks with Charlie Rose for an hour about the next steps he sees for U.S. Newspapers. He prescribes drastic steps to rescue the lions of the old media.
Here’s how this video clip opens up - which is brilliant story craft in its own right.
Charlie Rose:
So to play offense for a newspaper for you means what?
Marc Andreessen:
Oh, you got to kill the print edition.
Charlie Rose:
You would stop the presses tomorrow?
Marc Andreessen:
You have to kill it.
Charlie Rose:
Stop the presses tomorrow.
Marc Andreessen:
You have to kill it.
Charlie Rose:
Stop the presses tomorrow.
Marc Andreessen:
Stop the presses tomorrow. I’ll tell you what. The stocks would go up. Look at what’s happened to the stocks. This investors are through this. The investors are through the transition. You talk to any smart investor who controls any amount of money, he will tell you that the game is up. Like it’s completely over. And so the investors have completely written off the print operations. There is no value in these stock prices attributable to print anymore at all. It’s gone.
Charlie Rose:
So you would recommend to the owners of The New York Times, stop printing papers.Marc Andreessen:
Yeah, absolutely. You have to. You have to –
Charlie Rose:
And take your losses –
Marc Andreessen:
Yeah. You have to.
Charlie Rose:
Like a courageous person.
Marc Andreessen:
Chronic pain? Acute pain. How many years — music industry, same thing. How many years of chronic pain do you want to take to avoid taking a year of acute pain?
One thing is clear, 2009 will be a year of acute pain for struggling, debt-ridden U.S. newspapers. Over the weekend two publishing houses on the East coast announced they were entering bankruptcy.
Journal Register Co. files for bankruptcy protection
Philadelphia Inquirer bankrupt
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