One twist on the question is not just what libraries might do, since many would argue that they should remain neutral, but what might activists do to take advantage of what libraries offer.

When we read on and hear about the numerous newspapers that are closing down all across the country, it almost feels like we are losing a piece of American culture. These newspapers represented their societies, their cultures, and their cities in a manner that brought a sense of camaraderie to its people. For decades people got the paper devoted to their town. Someone from Ann Arbor, MI did not want the New York Times, they wanted the paper that talked about their town. But these barriers are breaking down. Now people want the papers from the big cities that talk about the issues going on there, the supposedly more important national issues. Yet, I know from my own family that we still care about our town paper; we receive both the Highland Park News and the Chicago Tribune. The bigger paper is important, but the smaller town paper still matters too. Families started these small town papers; they were not the massive corporations newspapers are today. The article points out how the Hearst Corporation, once a rival of the San Francisco Chronicle, now owns the San Francisco paper, despite having their headquarters in New York City. How can a company that is literally on the opposite side of the country adequately run a company so far away that they know little about and cannot keep up with the city’s culture? The answer is that they cannot. The brothers who started the San Francisco Chronicle, according to someone else from the time, “lived and died according to their notion of a newspaper’s purpose—that it should entertain and incite the population.” This was what the newspaper used to be about; entertaining the people of your town with the news specific to your town. Now, it is still largely about entertainment, but has become more of a national and even worldwide entertainment rather than the solely town oriented ones of the past.

The author makes the connection between a dying paper and a dying town. He notes that when the San Francisco Chronicle began dying out, the town began to die as well. These newspapers are not only news, but are much more. They represent the town, they represent the people, and they give life to the community. When the community begins to die and there is nothing left to write about, the newspaper inevitably begins to die. And, subsequently, the town dies with it because there is a large amount of revenue lost, but more importantly, the backbone of the community is lost. If a newspaper gets too old and out of touch, it loses its connection to the city. No longer is it a paper for everyone, but only a paper for the older generations who have different and specific interests the paper represents. Rodriguez says late in his article that “The Chronicle began to reprint Caen columns, to the bewilderment of anyone younger than thirty,” demonstrating to the reader how important it is to keep things relative to society at the time. A newspaper is not meant to meet the needs of only one group, it is meant to tell the news and to entertain.

Ironically, the thing Rodriguez particularly points to as a dying point of the Chronicle is the loss of obituaries: “As much as any vacancy in the Chronicle I can point to, the death of obituaries measures its decline.” The newspaper no longer included obituaries unless they were from famous people who had already appeared in the obituaries of more prominent papers or if the mourners paid for the obituary to appear in the paper. Before the town and newspaper was so interconnected that including obituaries was a given, but with the wedge that has come between the papers and their towns, the loss of obituaries means a loss of personal attention to the community. Once this connection with the community is lost, the paper will never survive.

Over and over again, through both teachers and classmates, I have heard the inevitable decline and later termination of the newspaper. I have also heard that this is due to our movement in the digital age. I would argue that our technological advancement has a lot to do with what we view and what we subscribe to. I would then propose that newspaper are on the internet now, and be viewed by the majority of Americans. News as a media will never go away, but the media on which t is transcribed is always changing. Which in some ways opposes Rodriguez who does not “believe the decline of newspapers has been the result solely of computer technology or of the Internet.” He tends to focus on the value the paper has to the community. The newspaper is a technology that is more seen has a social artifact. It is used to communicate, to inform, and ultimately gives character to the city in which it is published. Rodriguez points to the change in community, its growing atmosphere and people that actually can build or destroy the newspaper.

Many articles we read have dealt with the technology itself, the technology as an artifact that is ever changing and evolving. I remember Baron focusing on the pencil, in so much as the mechanics are described in detail; however, at first glance the pencil may seem completely different from the newspaper. But can a pencil carry the same politics as a newspaper. I think more times than not, we tend to look at technology as something that is always growing, I think it is interesting to read an article that takes social implications and social effects into account. It may not always be that technology becomes obsolete or dies just because we find something better. A good point of departure would be to examine how the technology functions socially. Other articles seems to rely on this idea of transportation, “What’s Next?” or what can we predict in the future. While sometimes people just tend to forget about things, or stop caring. I would say, from my experience, that many people do not follow the news, whether it be on print or online. Is it fair to blame the Internet for the decline of the newspaper? In part maybe. But I would suggest that the lack of interest plays a much bigger role.

My news usually comes from anything that I randomly run across. And I will actually read a newspaper that I find, than reading about news update via the web. Then there is the public and private sphere. America is a nation that has been moving towards privacy for ages. The sense of community has gone down because access to privacy is far more important. Community ties are failing, which I agree as a lot to do with the success of the newspaper. People in Chicago read the Chicago Tribune because it “their city,” it seems that it is ones duty to care about their city. Which in essence is a nationalistic view. Rodriguez, not to slander his words, feels that cities are losing this “pride.” Then what’s next? The nation?

In this day and age, people’s identities come from outside of their communities. Hence the Christian turned Atheist or vice versa. The things in which people most readily identify with are the things that are most important to them. And the things that are most important receive the most funds. I would argue that the Internet is a community, which may oppose Rodriguez’s idea. The community doesn’t change all the time, sometimes it just relocates, it is very nomadic in a sense. To tie down community with what is produced is very one-sided. Yes, many jobs have been lost due to these changes. But, many new jobs have been created. I am not an advocate of all things digital, but I would say that occupations have been taking a huge shift to online. This is discouraging to those left outside of the loop. There is a digital divide between the newspaper and the web. They are not necessary disconnected but rather tied together by a very, very thing string.

When the city of San Francisco changed, so did the paper. People get excited about things, “good” situations at least, that happen right around them. True. But technology has allowed us to be virtually anywhere. Almost creating a global community, rather than city by city. So the big question is: How do we get people to be more involved with the community? Take away the Internet? It depends from what and where we define our identities, and to what degree we identify.

According to Rodriguez, “with the passage of time, the name of the city [where a particular newspaper was written] was commonly attached
to the name of the newspaper…because the paper described the city and the city described the paper.” The newspaper at the time was described
as “a record of the city’s mundane progress.” “Along with theatrical and operatic listings, the Chronicle then published news of ships sailing into and out of the bay and the dollar equivalents of treasure in their holds, and bank robberies, and saloon shootings, and gold
strikes and drawings, and extraordinary numbers of suicides, likewise fires, for San Francisco was a wooden city.” Additionally, “American
newspapers were entrusted to be keepers of public records—papers were daily or weekly cumulative almanacs of tabular information…a newspaper’s morgue was scrutable evidence of the existence of a city.”

Men who were in charge of newspapers at the time were also seen as having a higher status in society than the common person. As the article explains, “Men, usually men, who assumed the sole proprietorships of newspapers in the nineteenth century were the sort of men to be attracted by the way a newspaper could magnify an already fatted ego. Newspaper publishers were accustomed to lord over cities.”

After the nineteenth century and beyond, the value of newspapers has entirely changed. Rodriquez does not explicitly take a stance either for or against the rise of technology as previous authors we have read in class. Instead, he explains “Newspapers will be lost because technology will force us to acquire information in new ways.” He explains the disconnect information has with place, “The cost of my cyber-urban experience is disconnection from body, from presence, from city.” Furthermore, “Our inclination has led us to invest a digital cosmopolitanism that begins and ends with ‘I’.” He describes a woman who was “mowed down by a honking bus” because she was so focused on her “personal sounds and her texting apparatus” rather than what was going on in the world around her.

Many public venues have been completely transformed. The coffee house culture of before the nineteenth century—the place where people came for the latest news and gossip has been forever replaced by “free wi-fi,” lap tops, and racks filled with unwanted newspapers, “Several men and women sat alone at separate tables. No one spoke. The café advertised free wi-fi; all but one of the customers had lap tops open before them.” The place where people get their news is entirely different. Not much is needed from word of mouth when we are constantly connected to the latest updates via headline news, e-mail lists, text message subscriptions, Facebook status updates, and Tweets.

The news is still alive in our culture; however, it has taken a completely new appearance. As Rodriquez’ friend explains, “If I think of what many of my friends and I read these days, it is still a newspaper, but it is clipped and forwarded in bits and pieces on email…It is like a giant newspaper being assembled at all hours,
from every corner of the world, still with news but no roots in a
place. Perhaps we do not need a sense of place anymore.”

The article particularly resonates with me because the description of the café is identical to the description I can make of Starbucks and other coffee shops that I have visited. From my experiences, there are two different patrons to these places. There is normally the small group or “couple” who is collaborating together, and then there is patron who is hard at work on a laptop. Rarely do I see someone with a physical textbook or newspaper.

I hear so many of my friends tell me about the stereotype that students at the University of Illinois are “unfriendly.” This impression mostly comes from the fact that the majority of students walk straight to where they need to go with headphones in ear, completely shut out from the rest of the world. Students walk down the street with stern looks on their faces, rarely do you see someone smile or acknowledge you, other than the occasional Facebook Wall post later in the day of “I saw you on the Quad today, you didn’t notice me, though.”

Nowadays, we have so many outlets that we can turn to in order to get news. My generation looks for sports and news updates via text message and online the most. Rarely do I see someone pick up a copy of a newspaper for this purpose. This is exact why so many newspapers are not doing as well as they used to. As Rodriguez explains, “Most newspapers that are dying today were born in the nineteenth century. The Seattle Post- Intelligencer, died 2009, born 1863. The Rocky Mountain News died 2009, born 1859. The Ann Arbor News died 2009, born 1835.” Newspaper companies flourished at a time when people resorted to print for their information. Now, when there are so many other options for news, many newspaper companies are still flourishing; however, in different ways. Rather than making money through purchases of newspapers, they are making money through online subscriptions and advertisements on their web sites.

The “Twilight of the American newspaper” article then goes on to discuss how the author began to read the San Francisco Chronicle at an early age. He was not from San Francisco; he was closer to Sacramento. However, he mentions how by reading the San Francisco Chronicle he was able to explore and learn about the city of San Francisco without having lived there. He argues that when the San Francisco Chronicle started dying out, the city itself started to die with it. His argument is that when an American newspaper dies, a place in America dies as well. By this, he implies that a newspaper is special to a place in America; a newspaper describes the city and the city describes the newspaper. This section reminded me of Victoria Carrington’s article “I write, therefore I am: texts in the city”. This article discusses the idea that the graffiti describes, and is part of, the city where it is displayed. This somewhat goes hand in hand with the idea that a newspaper describes the city and the city describes the newspaper.

The “Twilight of the American newspaper” then discusses the development of a certain newspaper named the Daily Dramatic Chronicle. Two brothers in the city of San Francisco published this newspaper. At first the newspaper was mostly about opera and shows. The newspaper eventually included actual news and events that occurred in the city of San Francisco. The article mentions how readers from all over the country were fascinated by any news of the gold rush city. This shows how as society and the city of San Francisco changed, so did the newspaper. The newspaper and the city become some sort of mutual force which influences change in each other. So, the change in society influences the newspaper to change. In a similar fashion, the newspaper causes change in society. An example of this is mentioned in the article. The brothers wrote a piece in their Daily Dramatic Chronicle that upset a certain someone that was mentioned in the piece. That person insulted the brothers’ mother, and later the person’s son killed one of the brothers of the Daily Dramatic Chronicle. In this way, the brothers lived by the newspaper’s purpose, which was “that it should entertain and incite the people”. All of this goes to show how close the relationship is between the newspaper and the city.

To further argue this claim, the article discusses how most newspaper publishers were accustomed to lord over cities. The newspaper itself is a misnomer because it is not simply a piece of paper that presents news articles. The article argues that the newspaper is a keeper of public record. It gives the example of announcing someone’s birth or death. Perhaps more importantly, a newspaper is evidence of the existence of a city. The connection I made with these ideas is to that of the Victoria Carrington article “I write, therefore I am: texts in the city”. In this article, Carrington mentions the idea that the urban graffiti is a personal narrative. This personal narrative tells a story of a person, but it also tells a story of the city. By removing the graffiti, you are removing a part of that person, but equally you are removing a part of the city. This is the same, if not more tragic, for the failed newspaper. From the information above, one can note how close the relationship is between the newspaper and the city. Another connection I made with the course readings is with Dennis Baron’s “National Handwriting Day”. In this chapter, Baron discusses the various changes in writing technologies over the years. He presents the question of whether the practice of handwriting is fading away for good? Some of the reasons why it might be dying out are because of technologies such as typewriters, computers, blogs, etc. This same argument can be said of the newspaper. The newspaper might be dying out because of technologies such as television, computers with internet, phones with internet, etc. As technologies change, society adapts to them. So, the newspaper may or may not be soon coming to an end, but it certainly has major consequences whenever one does go under.

After reading “Final Edition”, Dennis Baron’s A Better Pencil came to mind. The historical aspect of the article reminded me of the way Baron discussed the history of writing technologies, especially Thoreau and his beloved pencil. As interesting as the history of the pencil and San Francisco Chronicle are, parts began to blur or lose my interest. This could show the difference between generations and how history plays a role in our daily lives. Pencils have been a commonplace staple in my household and education, and the history of the Chicago Tribune is not something I am overly concerned about, whereas the histories of such things are vastly important to Rodriguez and Baron. I am not saying I do not care about the history of the world around me, it is just the things we take for granted are the things we often show little interest in learning about. The experience’s of one’s life results in the values a person has in knowing the history of parts of their lives. For instance, my generation may be lamenting about the downfall of the computer one day and the younger generation will simply think we are overdramatic about such an insignificant, old technology. People value the story behind objects that made an impact on their lives, much like how the newspaper impacted Rodriguez.

Baron and Rodriguez have noticed the disappearance, or obsoleteness, of writing technologies. Baron notes the computer has dominated the pencil and handwriting, whereas Rodriguez recognizes the downfall of the newspaper. However, neither wants to point an accusing finger at the computer, the internet or other advancements of technology. Rodriguez wants to make it clear that, “I do not believe the decline of newspapers has been the result solely of computer technology or of the Internet. The forces working against newspapers are probably as varied and foregone as the Model-T Ford and the birth-control pill.” In other words, yes, technology is a factor, but it is also the change in consumers’ interest in themselves and the world around them. Baron has similar logic when he is talking about the critics of computers and avid supporters of the pencil. Using a computer over a pencil is not a sin or indicates a person’s loss of intellect, it is only a matter of changing times and a change of a dominate writing technology. While neither want to blame technology advancement for the downfall of pencils, handwriting and newspapers, Rodriguez appears to take it more to heart. His article is much more personal and his opinion on the decline of newspapers is stressed more than Baron is in A Better Pencil. Baron does note the loss of identity with the decline of handwriting, but Rodriguez is stressing the loss of an entire community’s identity. A cities autonomy and overall closeness among citizens is something he is greatly concerned about. The personal touch of a local newspaper is something Rodriguez appears to lament over, whereas Baron is going with the flow, with the mentality that, “everything happens for a reason”.