“Print is dead,” Dr. Egon Spengler said in “Ghostbusters.” But how could it be? Print is so ingrained in society it is likely it will never die. Print is now just one of the ways you can get your news, making it a non-necessity.
Mehana Byrne, who creates print work for multiple publications such as Align Magazine and the Oregon Voice Magazine, feels strongly about the very lively atmosphere of print.
“It’s people who really, really love it (that) are keeping it alive; as long as we encourage other people to do it, there will always be a print culture,” Byrne said.
Print shows up in everyday parts of our lives, and we love it; even with the overtake of technology, we still choose to pick up that newspaper, brochure or magazine. You are reading the newspaper right now, for what reasons unknown; however, this shows the world’s passion for print. Print is evolving rather than dying; a study by the Statista research department found that “over 10% of U.S. adults responding to an August 2022 survey saying they read local papers every day.” There is a smaller but more dedicated group of people who stay with print.
Researchers from the University of Valencia, in Spain, published the study, “Do new forms of reading pay off?” which ran from 2000 to 2022, and showed that digital reading for leisure does not increase reading comprehension as much as print reading does. Print makes people feel good and is one of the reasons why it will stick around. “People like to hold what they read; it makes them feel smarter,” University of Oregon student Caleb Lanning said.
Due to the constant surrounding of technology, having access to everything in the world right in your back pocket, “news is just kind of thrown at you involuntarily,” Lanning said. When you make the conscious choice to pick up a newspaper or magazine, you are choosing to learn, holding the physical embodiment of what is current in your hands.
Although print culture is becoming smaller and a bit more saturated, Baby Boomers and Gen X aren’t the only ones picking up that newspaper. It takes us back to a time when things were better, when we were younger, whether it be 9-years-old or 30, print has this sweet nostalgia.
There is a certain magic to flipping through the pages of a cool new magazine. “I find magazines to be such a medium for storytelling that I don’t think anything else can really capture,” Byrne said.
“There has been an unexpected groundswell of support,” Founder of Cultured Sarah Harrelson said in an article from The New York Times. Teens and emerging adults are still finding the time to piece together zines, even if it’s just for the fun of it, and niche magazines like Have a Great Day Magazine or Cultured find great success in the market.
Print leaves room for more discovery, as you have fewer choices in what you see. In print, there is no algorithm, and though there is a bias in whatever newspaper you pick up, there are so many elements in each paper. It’s such a different experience doing it on your phone; you have to look through the whole page to get to the story you want to, leaving room to learn and discover more.
Print is irreplaceable in the effect that it creates. “Even if it’s not profitable … or even the most modern form of media … I think print is only dying if we let it die,” Byrne said.
