By Giovana Sanchez
On the last day of 2015, the Brazilian newspaper O Mossoroense printed its last edition on paper, and now offers only digital content on its website and mobile app. Created in 1872 in the northeastern city of Mossoró, Rio Grande do Norte, the newspaper is the third oldest in Brazil, according to the National Association of Newspapers.
In a farewell note, CEO Laíre Rosado remembered that when the newspaper was created, Mossoró had only 2,500 inhabitants, and that during the newspaper’s course of modernization, it was one of the first in the region to computerize the newsroom.
"To move the printed newspaper online is a requirement of the current times. Of course, it leaves a feeling of longing in all who are part the O Mossoroense family, but the nostalgia must be overcome," Rosado wrote in his Dec. 31 column.
Rosado also noted that there was a time when the newspaper's challenge was to reach out to neighboring municipalities through deliveries made by car. "Today, the digital edition has about 80,000 daily hits. The challenge is to pass 100,000 in the shortest possible time," wrote Rosado.
Brazilian journalist Mário Magalhães analyzed the change in an article published in Observatório da Imprensa: "The recession afflicting the country must have contributed to the extinction of the printed format. But the end is mostly a product of the fatigue of a business model which allowed the strength of the newspaper companies in the 20th century."
Note from the editor: This story was originally published by the Knight Center’s blog Journalism in the Americas, the predecessor of LatAm Journalism Review.
