D for Daily. They’ll always be Dirty in our hearts.

Starting next year, the Daily Emerald will cease production of their daily newspaper, and instead turn their attention to becoming an all-encompassing media company called the Emerald Media Group. This will entail publishing two bikweekly printed issues, as well as featuring “real-time news, community engagement, photo galleries and video on the web, mobile and social media, new web and mobile apps,” according to Ars Technica.

According to the Emerald, part of the reason for the change is financial, with advertising dollars disappearing while publishing costs remain the same. “The competition for the student ad dollar today is not (another newspaper.)” said Emerald publisher Ryan Frank in an interview with Ars Technica. “It’s Facebook and Twitter and YouTube. This is about following where the industry is going, about how we train our students to do the jobs that exist today.”

However, distribution and mission-related concerns also played into the final decision. As the Emerald notes in their brief on the new plan, “Daily is too slow. Our newsroom will report in real-time on our website, on mobile apps and through social media. We will wrap up our report with a morning email edition Monday-to-Friday. We will add blogs on topics relevant to college students, such as football, fashion and sex. We will engage with readers through whatever digital channel is most relevant to them.”

Only time will tell if this grand experiment succeeds, or falls flat on its face. Maybe it’ll take off, maybe even fewer people will read the Emerald. Maybe Ethos will laugh at EMG’s layouts at every turn. Hopefully fewer printed dailies will end up clogging storm drains on Alder. It’s going to be an experiment, and one hell of a jump.

“It’s time for a revolution,” the Emerald claims in a video promoting the upcoming change in direction. “Something completely different.”

However, one thing’s for sure: the Commentator will always find a way to make fun of our friends at the Ol’ Dirty. Cheers.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 5th, 2012 at 16:23 by Ashley and is filed under Ol' Dirty Emerald. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.