Each day more and more people get their news from the
internet. Most of these people no longer
read newspapers, except perhaps online.
They are missing something.
When you read things online, you tend to see the headlines
and big stories, easily missing the smaller news pieces. I came to this realization while reading an
actual newspaper, printed with ink on paper.
Of course, the main news stories were on the front page, but it’s the
smaller items on the inside that are the most interesting. Those smaller stories, sometimes no more than
a paragraph, are scattered throughout the newspaper. If they are even on the paper’s website, they
are not easy to find.
When you open a fullsize newspaper, sometimes you are faced
with a huge ad for some product, store or company. Many times, on the same page, there are small
news items with headlines that catch your eye.
One recent one concerned the mystery of the gravestone next to Lee
Harvey Oswald’s cemetery plot. The
gravestone read “Nick Beef” and until recently, no one knew who this person
was. The article identified the owner of
the plot, who is alive and thus was not buried there, and explained why he
purchased the cemetery plot. The article
was interesting but I can’t imagine anyone having seen it while reading a
newspaper online.
Another advantage of an actual newspaper is that you can
pick it up at any time, read it for a minute or two, put it down and pick it up
again later at the point you left off.
How often is that done with electronic news?
So, too, you can clip an article and save it. Has anyone ever been found with an electronic
news article folded in his wallet?
Of course, internet news is delivered much faster than a one
day old newspaper.
