The following appears on pantagraph.com

Famed magazine editor Tina Brown believes that the written word, and reading it, is dead.

Brown, who edited the New Yorker and was the last print editor for Newsweek magazine, recently proclaimed the death of magazines, journalism and reading.

“I think you can have more satisfaction from a live conversation,” Brown said at a conference in Goa, India. She said civilization is “going back to oral culture where the written word will be less relevant.”

Her comments were reported in the Hindustan Times and then made its way around the world via social media. The comments have been blogged about on several sites, and there was a story over a nationwide wire on her comments last week, which was published in many newspapers.

Now, you’re reading about it in this newspaper.

Not too bad for a dead form of communication.

There’s nothing wrong with live conversation, except it’s exceedingly inefficient. The give-and-take of conversation requires that a relatively few individuals be involved. If Brown would have wanted to spread her thoughts through “conversation,” it’s doubtful that her ideas would be outside the boundaries of Goa by now.

But what I find really irritating is how quickly some so-called experts want to declare the “death” of something when actually it’s going through more of a transformation.

Newsweek, for example, is no longer a print publication but it lives on as an online-only publication. Its chief competitor for decades, Time Magazine, continues in print and online. There are many reasons that the print version of Newsweek no longer exists. Maybe Brown feels her own failure to save Newsweek means that all magazines should “die.”

The truth of the matter, however, is that the written word and reading are not dead. But they are transforming.

It appears, however, that the traditional print magazine and book business is doing pretty well. The magazine rack is full of specialized magazines. While there may not be a market for Newsweek any longer, magazines focused on celebrities, simple living, food and specialized sports and hobbies appear to be doing quite well. Sales of traditional books have taken a hit, but that has been succeeded by sales of electronic books. Authors want to be read — I doubt that too many of them are particular how the information gets delivered.

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