Former 'FT' Editor Says Print Media Going Way of Vinyl Records

By: Jay DeFoore Just a week after leaving as editor of the Financial Times over what he called "strategic differences," Andrew Gowers has written a column in which he predicts the demise of newspapers that don't embrace the Internet.

Writing for the London Evening Standard, Gowers said, "Working in print, pure and simple, is the early 21st century equivalent of running a record company specialising in vinyl.

"The future lies with the Internet, and those newspapers that survive will be those that produce truly original content and learn fastest how to translate it into the all-encompassing, all-singing, all-dancing new medium of the web."

E&P was unable to locate an online version of the column, but the column was widely quoted by the British press.

Gowers also attacked News Corp. chairman Rupert Murdoch's conversion to the Internet, saying he "still chucks good money after bad on spanking new all colour presses and DVD circulation gains for the Times".