COLLEGE PARK, Md. — Print journalism is suffering yet another casualty. In March of 2020, the University of Maryland's student newspaper, The Diamondback, will cease publishing a print edition and focus its efforts digitally. The paper has been publishing since 1910, and has been financially and editorially independent of the school since 1971.
According to Tom Madigan, the board president of The Diamondback's parent company Maryland Media Inc, The Diamondback's digital audience is eight times larger than its print readership.
"Newspapers are no longer the most effective way to reach many readers at once," Madigan said in an op-ed published in The Diamondback. "And readers certainly don’t find newspapers the most convenient way to get the news."
The Diamondback's Editor-In-Chief Leah Brennan said print circulation has decreased from 20,000 per day in the '90s to a weekly distribution of 5,000 today. The website, however, saw more than 160,000 unique visitors in September.
This is not the first cutback the paper has seen. In 2013, The Diamondback cut its Friday edition, publishing four editions per week, and in 2015 the paper became a weekly publication.
"I think a lot of students were already getting their news from online, but I think there will be a nostalgia factor for some students," Anika Reed, a 2016 UMD graduate who now works for USA Today, said.
