Blog #4: Newspaper

 While newspapers are not as common in today’s society as they once were, they play an important role in our history in terms of communication. Newspapers are a form of mass media, and the main objective is to spread information to the public that is relevant, important and interesting to them!

Historians credit the ancient Romans with utilizing the first very rudimentary version of newspapers in their society. They called this form of daily news Acta Diuma.

In 1440 Gutenberg’s printing press was invented. During this time, a press could produce about 4,000 pages a day. As you can imagine, it became a lot faster to produce paper media, as every copy no longer had to be handwritten. It also became much less expensive to produce these mass amounts of printed news sources.

While the printed press was invented in the 1400s, it wouldn’t be until the 1600s that extremely fundamental versions of newspapers started to gain traction all over Europe and other areas like Japan. Sweden was actually the first country to ever grant freedom of the press to its citizens in 1766.

Over in the United States, the first newspaper, Publick Occurrences Both Forreign and Domestick was published out of Boston in 1690, but it was quickly shut down by the Massuchsetts governor after just one published issue. 

In 1721, a man named James Franklin--Benjamin Franklin's older brother--created an independent newspaper called the New-England Courant, The start of this newspaper is considered the beginning of independent newspaper publishing in the US! However, the US Government would not formally grant freedom of the press until 1791 with the First Amendment to the Constitution.

In the early 19th century, newspapers became more popular and heavily relied on as a form of mass media. This is because it became more useful as literacy rates went up. It also became a lot cheaper because of advancements in mechanics, communication, and transportation.

Along with this popularity came competition between different publishers. One of the greatest examples of this competition can be seen between two large newspapers in New York City--the Journal and the World. 

As a result of these publishers trying to one up each other and get more people to read their newspapers, yellow journalism was born.Yellow journalism focused on more polarizing topics such as violence and scandals as a way to catch peoples eye. Comic strips also were incorporated into newspapers. 

It was also around this time that newspaper boys became a part of newspaper culture in the late 19th century and early 20th century. These newsboys were given the nickname "newsies", and their job was to distribute newspapers in the city streets. If you’ve ever heard the phrase “Extra, extra, read all about it!” It comes from these boys.

For multiple centuries, newspapers were an integral part of society. People solely relied on them to consume news and important information. Even though newspapers aren’t as common anymore, we see how its impact has affected the media we consume most often today--such as the internet, television, and social media.