As a guy who is summoned on occasion to bring the dynamite - I think you are right, Mark, about the scope of the change needed to match the dynamics of the new game.

The breathtaking speed at which these patterns of media consumption change means that the first thing a smart leader will recognize is that they have to redesign their culture and smartly redeploy their resources.

Change and rapid change is a huge challenge to many U.S. newspapers.

Darwin noted that it was not the smartest or strongest who survived evolutionary changes - rather those that best adapted to the changes to their environment.

Food for thought: Ask yourself - what would your paper be like if it were edited by a 29-year-old. Would it be edited like the electryifying A4-size, full color daily 24 SATA in Zagreb and it's 29-year-old man in charge- Boris Trupcevic?

Or what if the web guy in your group was now in charge of 'all the journalism your newsroom produces' - a promotion made just this week at The Guardian.

Indeed there are a few 'fully-trained' journalists out there (print, video and web development, ahem . . .) but we're going to need not only more of these but top brass willing to build more nimble, rapid response story teams that not only embrace multimedia techniques but value (nee Embrace!) interactive and participatory media.

It's not enough to just push out information that is unavailble anywhere else - a modern news group must facilitate a community and provide an invaluable experience that their users simply cannot find anywhere else.

- robb montgomery

Bold headlines, on a topic that people find interesting, in any place a person may succumb to curiosity and decide they're in the market for a read will sell no matter if it's print, web, cellphones, skywriting, parchment, papyrus or stone.

Amen!

I agree with all of these comments. Just tweaking the design and expecting that to produce big results is nuts. As Robb says, it's all about change (something newspapers are terrified of and not very good at).

I'll go even farther: What we should be concentrating on right now is content. What we put in the paper isn't what people are willing to pay for. Get the content right and the design will follow just fine.

And just because our web numbers are going up now doesn't mean they will continue to do so in the future. We need to forget what we think we know about this business and learn anew.

So, let's get out the dynamite! Time to make some changes.

Amen. Content is king. Bad design can hurt you, but even great design can't save you.

Newspapers trying to hang on to old business models and practices need to face facts. Information is everywhere. Organizations that want to survive had better figure out how to serve it up and to whom.

Without these kinds of conversations -- and they should be happening now -- newspapers are facing some sad days.

Good post.

Perhaps it should start with two questions:

Why are we on paper?

What can we do that no one else can?

New Yorkers read New York Post, daily News, The Sun, politics, old fashion, conservatives and old people read New York Time, who spend the money in advertising, and who read newspapers?, PEOPLE, regular people, they like Internet, colors, they like Ipod, Cellular Technology, They like Bold and colorful newspaper, who like boring and old fashion, you?, me? or the advertisers, in real world, New York Times, Washington Post, L.A. Times and Chicago Tribune are Dinosaurs, and which is the best paper around the World, The Guardian, The Observer (Sunday) Colors, Colors, Colors, please we dying...open your eyes. Don't support old styles...

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