The Printed Blog: Stop the Presses

The presses have been stopped on The Printed Blog, which sought to reverse the trend of print copy migrating to the Internet, instead acquiring content from bloggers and actually printing it in local newspapers.

According to the announcement from publisher Joshua Karp, the company is ceasing operations due to a lack of outside investment capital, but the idea was far from a complete failure.

Karp’s idea, as described by Editor & Publisher, “was to get content from local bloggers with their permission and, eventually, some kind of payment. The content was put in a highly templated format that, Karp ultimately hoped, could change not just by city but by neighborhood. The highly targeted paper, distributed by hand at mass-transit stops, was supposed to be cheap to produce for low ad rates that ultimately would sustain the paper.”

Karp reflected on The Printed Blog in his blog:

Last year, I had an idea. I wondered what would happen if some of the business-model principles that work online were applied to the troubled newspaper industry. The more I thought about it, the more the curiosity got to me. So I registered a domain name, developed an action plan and started the process of building a new kind of newsprint publication.

Everyone said I was nuts, but I did it anyway.

16 issues, 80,000 print copies distributed, another 100,000 or so copies downloaded and countless new friends, fans and collaborators all around the world later, I may still be nuts, but I have zero regrets.

I’m disappointed, to be sure, but also looking forward to the future. I believe the next few years will be among the most exciting times in the history of journalism. The industry’s landscape is on the verge of major change and, when redefined, it will look a lot different than it does today. It will also function considerably better.

Join Baratunde Thurston (left), The Onion’s Director of Digital and author of How to Be Black, for an entertaining look at creative social media campaigns in our Social Media Marketing Boot Camp starting February 16. Other speakers include Morin Oluwole (Facebook), Tim Devane (bitly), and SocialTimes' writer Devon Glenn.   Register now.