Newspaper thoughts

As part of the newspaper-reading generation - I paid for a trip to Europe when I was 16 by delivering them - I've watched them with particular interest. Of the three I read daily, two - the FT and the WSJ - seem to be doing OK. The third - the NYT - is clearly struggling. Perhaps what distinguishes the NYT from the others is its legacy as a NY paper. For better or for worse, it's planted there. The others have a wider orbit. It's clear that the WSJ has the FT in mind (and in its sights) in its latest incarnation. Murdoch may be ignoring the NYT because he regards it as mortally wounded. (Enter Carlos Slim, but why? To own the supposed US newspaper of record? Is that concept still meaningful?) By the way, there were 14 daily newspapers in NY when I delivered them. The epic strike of 1963, in which the press unions were broken, put most of those dailies out of business. To give a sense of how life has changed, the NYT put out an issue the Sunday after the strike that carried all the news that hadn't fit heretofore. It weighed eight pounds. I loaded my bicycle, and when I tried to get on, it fell over. I had to walk the route.