My good friend Joe wrote a lovely little piece on the joys of being at the cottage and ultimately on the death of the newspaper. I think he’s a bit off on his prediction, simply because of the timing. He thinks that the newspaper will be gone in 10 years. I think that he is a technophile (and one of the best) but does not realize that the majority of the population are technophobes. How does one open a laptop to read a newspaper on the bus or subway (no wi-fi down there)? Reading on an iPod? Please. Squinting and moving your finger around a tiny screen is nothing compared to the feel and ease of a paper. I love reading online, but I also thoroughly enjoy the paper as well. You can “stumble on” to an article you wouldn’t normally read in a paper.
So Joe, although you may eventually be right, I think that Mark Twain had it accurate when he said “Rumours of my demise are greatly exaggerated.”