THE LAST PRINT RUN

Showcasing the Last Print Editions of Queensland's Regional Newspapers Closed in June 2020

ALL GOOD THINGS...

On May 28, 2020 News Corp announced it would stop the presses on 112 local and regional newspapers around Australia, closing 36 small papers completely and onlining the other 76.

In Queensland, the overwhelming majority of those newspapers slated to cease printing were former APN publications bought out by News Corp in mid 2016.

Those who work in these earmarked publications feel like they are abandoning their communities, knowing that online coverage by centralised, gutted, overstretched news teams will only ever be an echo of what came before, a footnote to the long and proud history of the local rag.

Using the visual and physical nature of a public space installation, this legacy project hopes to illustrate the sheer mass of regional coverage that is being digitised, homogenised or lost in its entirety with the closure or onlining of these newspapers.

“I had one old man in tears – he said he’d put an 'In memoriam' notice in the paper for his wife every year since she passed away - he didn’t want her to be forgotten.”

Journalist, Dalby Herald

“We’ve had farmers up our ribs for this decision – they can’t read the news on the internet…they have to climb up a tree just to get a signal for a phonecall.”

Journalist, Western Star

PROJECT CO-ORDINATORS

Dr Kasun Ubayasiri

MEAA State Delegate, Griffith University Journalism Academic and Former APN Journalist (Rural Weekly)

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Linda Brady

Former APN Journalist, Sub, COS and Editor (Morning Bulletin, Whitsunday Times, Queensland Times)

With the assistance of Griffith University journalism students and alumni across the state.