I’m not entirely comfortable about where we’re going with the decline of journalism.

I’m not saying that it’ll be a worse world. But it could be.

The press has got flaws and imperfections, but modern democracy has had it around and relied on it.

Shifts like the rise of 24/7 cable news eliminating local news, social media rising, and magazines and newspapers going into serious decline are changes that could have a lot of hard-to-assess impact on society.

I think that we’ll work out fixes for some of the things. And we’ve had benefits of new media. But…I feel like maybe we could wind up seriously regretting having a lot of the press go away. It won’t be easy to rebuild if we wanted to do so.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_of_newspapers

United States

From 2005 to 2021, about 2,200 American local print newspapers closed.[20] From 2008 to 2020, the number of American newspaper journalists fell by more than half.[20]

Where once the ability to disseminate information was restricted to those with printing presses or broadcast mechanisms, the Internet has enabled thousands of individual commentators to communicate directly with others through blogs or instant message services.[64] Even open journalism projects like Wikipedia have contributed to the reordering of the media landscape, as readers are no longer restricted to established print organs for information.[65]

With profits falling, many newspapers have cut back on their most expensive reporting projects—overseas bureaus and investigative journalism.[92] Some investigative projects often take months, with their payoff uncertain. In the past, larger newspapers often devoted a portion of their editorial budget to such efforts, but with ad dollars drying up, many papers are looking closer at the productivity of individual reporters, and judging speculative investments in investigative reports as non-essential.[83]

Observers point out that the reliability and accountability of newspapers is being replaced by a sea of anonymous bloggers, many with uncertain credentials and points of view. Where once the reader of a daily newspaper might consume reporting, for instance, by an established Cairo bureau chief for a major newspaper, today that same reader might be directed by a search engine to an anonymous blogger with cloudy allegiances, training or ability.[95]

The closure of local newspapers has created a phenomenon of news deserts. A June 2022 report estimates that approximately 70 million Americans live in a county with one or no local news organization.[97]

Decline in political neutrality

The shift from news coverage in geographical regions to online markets likely contributed to increased political polarization in the 2000s and 2010s.[106] Research has linked the closures of newspapers to declines in civic engagement of citizens,[4][5] increases in government waste,[6] and increases in political polarization.[7] The decline of local news has also been linked to the increased “nationalization” of local elections.[8][9] As citizens have fewer opportunities to read about local politics, they are attracted to national sources (such as cable news) and begin to interpret local politics via national politics.[7][107]