Hello, got some personal stuff going on today. So I will not be providing new content, but wait, there's more. I'm going to pop on a show that I did in 2008 called the Ernesto Durango show, which you're going to hear first is me talking a little bit about the show. And then you will actually hear the whole show.
The whole thing is under six minutes. So hang in there, but this should be fun. They should be finding ways to improve. They should be finding ways for people to enjoy the newspaper even more.
But to tell you, though, I kind of miss sitting down and wanting to read on paper. Now I kind of look at my laptop. For Ernesto Durango, I'm Michael Croce. Let me go over here and see what I'm going to do.
Well, now we have another Ernesto Durango show. Hi, I'm Michael Croce. And yes, I pre-record and pre-mix the Ernesto Durango shows. On today's episode that you're going to watch or listen to right now, I talk about newspapers and how they are becoming obsolete, how they're dwindling away, how they're shrinking.
Can we save newspapers? Man, I sure hope we can. But take a look and listen to the Ernesto Durango show. And now, ladies and gentlemen, Accent Radio Network proudly presents a program under-filed, unadulturated, pure and simply the best four and a half minutes of your Saturday morning ritual.
It's the Ernesto Durango show. We hope it will sit back and enjoy. And now your host Ernesto Durango. I began my love affair with newspapers in the winter of 1960.
I was nine years old. It was the coldest winter in ages in Michigan where I lived. And we used to get the Inquirer and News out of Battle Creek. And on the weekends, on Sunday, we got the Detroit Free Press.
It was so exciting for me to read the newspaper as a young person to go through and read the funnies, of course, and on the weekends, the funnies were in color. They had a magazine section. They had the TV listings for Detroit and we didn't live in Detroit. And it was really fun for me to see what was on TV there.
I really miss the newspapers the way they used to be. They're not that way anymore. I remember in the 1970s, my first wife was actually the youth editor of the Clearwater Sun and I got to hang out there and meet a lot of the reporters, a lot of the old gruffy cigarette hanging out of their mouth, take a shower every two days, reporters who went out and worked the beat. And I remember meeting the women's section editor and then just seeing how newspapers ran right up close and personal.
Very exciting times in my life. I remember reading the St. Petersburg Times through some really tumultuous times in our life. It was incredible what we found in the newspapers.
Man's first walk on the moon. All kinds of interesting things through the years. And I have to tell you, as I grew older, reading the newspaper became a ritual for me. And if you don't believe me, ask anyone in my family.
No one was allowed to touch the newspaper before I do. OK, I would lay it out on my dining room table and I would go through the sections one at a time. I would start with the national news. Didn't spend a lot of time there.
My favorite section was the local news part of the paper where you could read up on all kinds of things. Then I would skip the sports section. I would read over the business section. I remember our local newspaper on Mondays had a whole tabloid at one time set up for business.
And so did the Tampa trivia. That was really great. And then I would go to the funnies and in the funnies, I would start off with Dunesbury and then I would I still have I have Dunesbury clippings from the 1970s. It was just amazing that I've kept all these years.
And then I would read and right now I read Blondie and then classic peanuts and that's about all. And then I was done with the newspaper and then a sad thing started happening to our newspapers across the country. It was called the Internet, you know, that thing on the computer that you go to every day. People have stopped reading newspapers.
The Tampa Tribune is shrunk rather dramatically. The same Petersburg times is shrunk rather dramatically all across the country were reading about all kinds of people that are being let go. The Tampa Tribune let go a bunch of reporters. The same Petersburg times is buying out their reporters.
Helen Huntley, one of the financial columnists who I've read for years is out of there, out of a job, you know, just been bought out of her contract, been done, sent out to pasture. You know, Bob Ross, a movie critic over at the Tampa Tribune, gone all kinds of newspapers that Detroit free press. My first newspaper that I became addicted to is now considering only delivering three days a week. What's that?
And you know what? I hate to admit this, but in November, I let the subscription to the St. Petersburg times go. And they called and said, why?
I said, well, because the paper is no longer what it used to be. There's hardly any local talent there writing anymore. Most of the stuff is taken off of press releases. And you know, they said, well, we have all this competition with the internet.
Well, I think when things are starting to look bad with business, they should get better instead of worse. So I guess I don't feel too sorry for the newspapers. They should be finding ways to improve. They should be finding ways for people to enjoy the newspaper even more.
I have to tell you though, kind of miss sitting down in the morning and reading my paper. Now I kind of look at my laptop. For an Esso Durango, I'm Michael Crose. Let me go over here and read the Huffington Post.