Print is dying -- except when history happens

Just when you thought that print was dead entirely: Newspapers are reporting that demand for their Wednesday morning editions -- the ones reporting the election of Barack Obama -- have caused a rush on the market. 

It appears that having an old-fashioned printed newspaper announcing Obama's victory -- a solid, you-can-touch-it souvenir of what many see as an historic occasion -- is still important. It's something you want to hold on to and save for your children and grandchildren as evidence of interesting times and as a prompt for family stories. ("Grandma spent election day at a phone bank, that's a place where people gathered to call other people on the telephone and urge them to vote... No, dear, I'm not going to tell you again what a telephone is, look it up....")

In fact, these headlines are perceived as having so much intrinsic value that some folks are even trying to flog them on eBay -- mostly unsuccessfully. I checked eBay this morning, and among the copies of the NY Times being advertised there, bids are going as high as $15; several optimistic capitalists who are pricing them from $25 up to $500 are going without bids. (If they wait a year or so, they may do better.)

I can understand that. We have developed a tradition of newspapers as records of historic events and proof that you were there -- the use of newspapers in old movies as records of time passing, or that shot of President Truman triumphantly holding up a newspaper reading "Dewey Defeats Truman" are practically part of our cultural heritage.

Meanwhile, despite this evidence of print's importance, the death of the printed page continues apace. US News and World Report, formerly one of the primary weekly sources for news, has now announced it's going strictly Web, with its print publications limited to once-a-month consumer guides. The Christian Science Monitor, a century-old publication, is going totally online as well. And I don't want to think about how many formerly thriving print tech publications have either been reduced to the thickness of a brochure or disappeared completely.

It's possible that the surge of demand for print newspapers may be the dying gasp of a technology that belongs to past centuries. It's possible that, 50 years from now, historic events will be remembered using other means. But I've got to say: Showing your grandkids a printout of a Web page, or an electronic album with tiny videos, just won't have the same cachet as a printed front page headline.