3 takes on why bookstores are dead

Management consultant Joseph Esposito writes, “With bookstores collapsing everywhere, the print business collapses along with it.” As bookstores close, Esposito argues, readers have fewer places to discover print books. Instead, he says, they learn about titles online — through Twitter, Goodreads, or Amazon pages. When it comes time to order the book, they have two options: A cheaper digital version or a more expensive print version. “Why pay for print when you can get the digital edition immediately at a lower price? The advantage of the physical bookstore — the immediate availability of inventory — is not at play here.”

Read more at GigaOm

Radio Ad Revs Flat, Digital Ads Rise

Radio advertising revenues were unchanged in the second quarter of 2013 compared to the year before, according to the latest figures from the Radio Advertising Bureau, which tallied total revenue at $4.66 billion. As in previous quarters, the main bright spot for radio was digital advertising, which saw a 16% year-over-year increase, to $222 million.

Read more here

Study finds more than a quarter of journalism grads wish they’d chosen another career

"About 28 percent of journalism grads wish they’d chosen another field, the annual survey of grads by the University of Georgia’s Grady College says." More at Poynter

The same study also showed "The job market for journalism and mass communication graduates showed signs of continued improvement in 2012 and 2013, suggesting that the worst in terms of the market is in the past."  Read more from the school here

‘The Daily Show’ on Jeff Bezos and the newspaper industry

John Oliver of “The Daily Show” explains how “there are now more people currently buying newspapers than people buying newspapers.”

Facebook: Here's How Your News Feed Works

The average user’s News Feed has around 1,500 possible stories filtered through per day, according to Lars Backstrom, engineering manager for Facebook’s News Feed ranking. But only 20% of them actually make your feed. So how does Facebook determine which 20% you see?

Scores are determined using a number of factors, such as the relationship you have with the user who posted it, the number of comments, the number of shares, and the number of likes that the story has accumulated.

A change in the ranking process now enables older stories (stories that may have been posted earlier in the day but the user never actually scrolled through) to join the “new” stories at the top of your feed.

Read more at ABC News

Study Finds Craigslist Took $5 Billion From Newspapers

A new study by two business school professors examined the issue and concluded that, indeed, Craigslist took a giant bite out of newspapers’ revenues — some $5 billion between the years 2000 and 2007. And that’s not even looking at the Times, the Wall Street Journal or USA Today, which the authors left out in order to have a more homogeneous sample.

Read more at Forbes

More Print News Subscribers Plan To Cancel Subs, Uptick In Mobile Consumption

The Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute’s “2013 Q1 Research Report,” revealed that 12.7% of print subscribers plan to cancel their subscriptions in 2013.

On the positive side, the decline in print subscriptions is clearly correlated with increasing consumption of news via digital channels, with a special emphasis on mobile.

Read more at Media Post