Untelevisable Times

Will television put newspapers out of business? To help find out, the New York Times made a five-day test-yourself survey. Last week, at a meeting of the New York State Publishers' Association, the Times'''s Publisher Arthur Hays Sulzberger announced the comforting results. The Times is practically untelevisable.

"During those five days," he said, "the New York Times published just over 2,000 individual stories. In making this check, the stock table was counted as one story whereas reports from London and Berlin of the same situation were counted as separate stories. Of these 2,068 stories we calculate that 207, or 10%, would have lent themselves to some phase of television . . . Fully half of [these] were in the sports category . . . Only . . . eleven appeared on Page One and it is doubted that more than six would have been good viewing.

"Television and radio can never replace the newspaper which devotes itself to the comprehensive publication of news. [They] are primarily media of entertainment, and the newspaper, which gives information, is not threatened by them. On the other hand, the newspaper which holds its readers through its entertainment features is,threatened . . . The New York Times at the present moment has no plans for entering the television field."*

In Harper's Magazine, New York Lawyer Bernard B. Smith took a less professional but much darker view. "Newspaper publishers," said he, "are threatened by television's sudden rise. That the publishers realize this is demonstrated by the fact that about half of the applications for television licenses have been filed by newspapers . . . According to many surveys and tests, television advertising has a sharper impact than advertising either in the newspaper or over the radio. When, therefore, five years from now . . . there are 11 million television-equipped homes in America, as against the present figure of only some 400,000, a not inconsiderable portion of our free American press may be headed toward becoming a bankrupt press."

* Even if it had, no New York channel is now available. The Times also has no plans for a fac simile edition, after months of experimental trans mission.

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