Success Quote by Will McDonough

A neat prediction disguised as a shrug: newspapers will survive, but as furniture, not force. Will McDonough’s line lands because it separates longevity from power, refusing the usual binary of “dead” versus “thriving.” He’s not mourning print so much as diagnosing an authority shift. The sentence hinges on that “but,” a pivot that drains the comfort out of “always.” Yes, the object remains; no, the institution doesn’t.

McDonough was writing from inside an era when newspapers were still the agenda-setting machine: the morning paper framed the day, the editorial board could bruisingly shape local politics, a front page could elevate a scandal into a crisis. His claim anticipates the unbundling of that monopoly. Even if newspapers persist as brands or products, influence migrates to whatever captures attention fastest, targets audiences most precisely, and updates continuously. The subtext is less about paper than about gatekeeping. “We’ll always have” implies a cultural habit, even nostalgia; “lose influence” implies an economic and psychological reality: readers stop treating the paper as a referee.

There’s also a sly realism in the modesty of “lose,” not “collapse.” He leaves room for survival strategies: specialization, investigative prestige, local reporting as a civic utility. But he also forecasts the humiliation that comes with diminished centrality. Newspapers can still be right, even essential, while no longer being the place where everyone finds out what happened. That’s the real demotion: from shared public square to one voice among many, arguing for attention in a louder room.