"The overarching purpose of access to information legislation is to facilitate democracy. It helps to ensure first, that citizens have the information required to participate meaningfully in the democratic process, and secondly, that politicians and bureaucrats remain accountable to the citizenry."

Gerard LaForest, former Supreme Court of Canada Justice (1997)

Justice Gerard LaForest made those observations in the course of explaining his reasons for judgment in Dagg vs Canada (Minister of Finance), a case that involved a challenge to a withholding of information that Ottawa-based researcher Michael A. Dagg had sought under a Freedom of Information request.

In a less constrained environment, LaForest might have expanded his theme to include what, arguably, is the overarching purpose of the media in a democratic society. Surely, there is no more appropriate conduit for the transfer of information about a government to its people, than ethical journalists toiling in an unfettered media environment?

Yet for more than a decade, many who follow the news in British Columbia have come to believe there was a direct link between the decline of the Canwest-Global empire forged by Manitoba media mogul Israel (Izzy) Asper and the fact that the mainstream media was giving the B.C. Liberals a soft ride on their economies of truth and closed-door machinations. Suspicion abounded that Canwest's need to pull in lucrative government advertising revenue was influencing editorial opinion in the two large dailies and that, at best, journalists were writing the stories they believed would be allowed into print.

At this point, I should make it clear that in 21 months of submitting columns to this paper, I have never been told what stories to write, or the position to take when I write them. On the contrary -- when I expressed uncertainty about one of my early columns, I was told, "That's what you're there for; columnists are expected to have an opinion."

Monopolies never bode well for the ubiquitous little guy and, for that reason alone, I became very concerned when Canwest began its acquisition of community newspapers in British Columbia. I did not want to see the success and uniqueness of the North Shore News controlled from a corporate headquarters somewhere else.

As it happens, I need not have worried.

Nevertheless, from the moment the conglomerate's PAC-man-like appetite swallowed up 13 Alliance Atlantis specialty channels, I sat back to await the collapse I believed was inevitable.

In hindsight, that $2.3 billion acquisition of programming outlets like the Food Network, Showcase, Home and Garden Television (HGTV) and others, may well have set Canwest-Global on the path to the $3.9 billion deficit that rendered it vulnerable to bankruptcy protection and to last month's takeover by a Postmedia Network group led by Paul Godfrey, former National Post publisher.

Today, there are lessons still to be heeded from the downfall of the remarkable -- and traditional -- newsprint house that Izzy built.

In the main, although subscriptions are a welcome source of income, newspaper revenues are derived from advertising sales.

That said, because advertising rates are based on proven circulation numbers, it pays to keep readers happy so that, in a reasonable economy, everything else can fall into place.

This begs the question: In a world of rapidly-changing technology how is that happiness to be achieved?

As CBC News stated in its April 30 analysis Media Convergence, Acquisitions and Sales in Canada: "Changing platform demands, coupled with squeezed revenues, have dramatically changed the media landscape in recent years. Many companies tried to diversify, though for some this has resulted in financial disarray."

So how does that fit with the opinion of Camas Courier editor, Edward Reagan who, you may remember from my June 23 column, said: "Readers haven't gone to the Internet and other news media because it is cheaper or easier; they've gone because they no longer trust what the major newspapers are printing."

What Reagan's words imply, is that the readers so essential to the underpinning of advertising revenues are unlikely to support the mainstream media, no matter what "print platform" is employed, unless they are able to trust what they are reading.

Local online chatter suggests that many traditional reader-subscribers have, indeed, abandoned the MSM in their rush to online news sites to read what, rightly or wrongly, they believe is more trustworthy information.

Whether or not their reaction is justified, time will tell.

What is clear is that, with the exception of a handful of excellent online publications and commentators, a perusal of local blog-sites -- and that's what most of them are -- suggests that, good, bad or indifferent, they are commentaries built around information gleaned directly from articles published in the MSM.

In other words, most of these "alternative" editorial exchanges of opinion could not exist were it not for the work already performed by many of the professionals employed by traditional media organizations.

Be that as it may, what will that readership exodus mean for the MSM?

Without doubt, it is partly responsible for Godfrey's stated intention to implement a "digital first" publication model.

"Print people have to be digital people, not just on the editorial side, but in advertising as well," he announced.

Indeed. But, with respect, the reverse is also true.

Paul Godfrey and I are of the same generation, but that doesn't mean I cannot be as forward-thinking and digital as the best of them.

In so being, however, I have no wish to discard the news-gathering, fact-checking and analytical traditions of the "old-style" newspapers that still exist at the heart of communities across this country. If a newspaper reflects its community, a job the North Shore News does excedingly well, that reflection should not be distorted by the rush to be "first" instead of the need to be "true."

It is too soon to know what effect the changes will have on the dedicated 15th Street team over at the North Shore News; but all indications are they will not be able to rest on the laurels of the paper's decades-long achievements.

When I mentioned my thoughts out loud, namely that the Postmedia group would still have an ongoing need for the all-important revenue stream, editor Martin Millerchip was not at all perturbed by the prospect of a strengthened digital focus, but volunteered some interesting facts about the business side of the News; that is, the paper as a vital profit centre.

"Our demographics suggest a well-educated readership," he began, "and audited surveys show a better than 80 per cent market penetration across the entire North Shore."

Justifiably proud of the paper, Millerchip also pointed out that, "Despite the fact that the North Shore is a relatively "fixed" community in size when compared to most other expanding Metro municipalities, the News weathered the recession in better financial shape than any of its 11 sister papers in the Lower Mainland Publishing group."

Encouraging news for someone like me who, years ago, had heard rumbles that flying visits from "the boss" to the floors of Canwest papers, consisted of a short review of revenue performance, little to no discussion of news or editorial content, and no expression of interest as to reader satisfaction.

If true, that back-end first attitude, would, in any enterprise, lead to a demoralized work-force. In the case of MSM operations in British Columbia, it was not the best way to sell the corporate message of "convergence."

But with new owners, new financing and less debt, there is opportunity for a positive outcome in these times of change for PostMedia Network.

It remains to be seen whether the interests of readers, and the tenets of professional journalism in a functioning democracy can overcome the constraints of convergence, cost-cutting and the special interests of shareholders.

rimco@shaw.ca