News came down over the weekend of another gay media outlet shutting down. Window Media, LLC the publisher of The Washington Blade, The Southern Voice, The Houston Voice and South Florida Blade closed its doors and have ceased publication. The company had been struggling financially for more than a year.
This announcement comes less than a month after hearing that The Advocate, the country's oldest LGBT new magazine will cease its monthly publication, will no longer be available on newsstands and will be added as a quarterly insert in Out magazine. It's been a year of gay newspapers and lesbian websites shutting down. What's going on?
Some blame the demise of gay media on the economy and decrease in ad sales. Others say that mainstream publications are more willing to cover LGBT issues, so the need for gay-specific media is no longer necessary.
I disagree. While our major issues, like marriage and anti-gay violence may get mainstream coverage, there are many, many topics that only LGBT media take on. Like what happened after Prop 8 passed in California. Or the raiding of gay bars recently in Texas and Atlanta.
The gay media offers a perspective and in depth coverage that can't be found in mainstream media. Besides, mainstream print media is also suffering. As daily papers cut staff and budgets, how will they find the space to give coverage to our issues?
Am I the only one concerned about this? Add your thoughts to the comments below.
In Chicago, we have 3 weekly publications that are free. I have often thought that to save paper, etc., they should publish every 2 weeks. Much of the advertising & listing of events is repeated, so every 2 weeks would be enough. Maybe the Windy City Times & The Chicago Free Press should alternate weeks. The Gay Chicago magazine, which is printed on newsprint is the other one.
Then there are quarterly publications like Pink & others. Thre have been others that have gone out of business, but in our area, there are plenty of gay publications.
I like being able to read free papers & see the future of newspapers to have smaller free ones with the advertising paying for it.
Often, business people do the ‘all or nothing at all’ approach. What some publications should do is cut the number of issues. It’s better for the employees to be part-time than unemployed.
The Washington Blade announced today that they’re going to try & continue. They’re coming up with a plan to keep running.
The problem is partly due to the GLB community once again not supporting these publications. I rarely, if ever see a LGB related article in my local paper, The Charlotte Observer. Sometimes they will print a blurb about an event or an issue. But that’s about it. National level media is always more willing to confront issues dealing with our lives, but again it only touches the surface and never digs down. I know I get LOGO on my cable service, but I never watch it. I wonder if this could mean that Americans are getting more and more accepting of homosexuality. The fact is that it has always been, always will be and will be in the future. At least that is what my good friend, a Methodist minister in GA says. These publications that were printer for free, The Washington Blade, for instance have a real community sense. They ran the local stories. I loved that when I was living in DC. As for The Advocate, I think that they are smart becoming an insert in an all advertisement magazine such as OUT. Too bad they will only reach about a third of their original readers. They did lock themselves out of being able to interview the big names. Too bad. Now, we have a chance to lobby the big papers to have columns relating to the LGB community, just like the Charlotte Observer has for the Christian Community. As I write this, I wonder if the Christian Science Monito has any LGB articles! Maybe I should get reading in my time unemployed.
Remember all the gay and lesbian book stores that served our community only 10, 15 years ago? Almost all have closed. Like newspapers and magazines today, they lost the competition to bigger corporate entities, like B&N and Borders in the case of books.
Now, we have the paltry LGBT sections in those chains; no depth, no real diversity, just a half-hearted effort to fill those 4 or 5 shelves.
I fear the same fate is in store for us in the print media. I suppose some LGBT coverage will migrate to the internet and social networking sites, but I agree, we must have a flagship print voice, like the Advocate. Perhaps, one of the existing publications will remake itself and be the national presence we need.
As for local print media, I have low expectations. I live in Albuquerque, NM and we do have a visible lesbian and gay community, but no LGBT publication, no LGBT book store and only one gay-specific club. Seems we will have to make our issues important to the mainstream media since alternate venues have been co-opted or bankrupted.
I this article misses a big trend: most people now get their news from the internet & blogs like the Huffington Post have replaced the print media. LGBT bloggers are among the most internationally known internet journalists & political commentators. The internet gives access to the global LGBT community & reflects a diversity of perspectives. The old LGBT print media like the Advocate was dominated by white men & women. I am so happy that the gay rights movement it is no longer an American phenomenon. Also, Proposition 8 was the most widely covered LGBT story in the mainstream U.S. media.