With the demise of the printed Daily Mercury hitting the headlines in recent weeks, as a community service club, Soroptimist International of Mackay decided to ask members and community:
Why is this printed paper so important to you?
I have bought the Mercury for many years – had it delivered for 30 years then someone walking earlier than I get up was stealing it so my husband & I took to walking to the Newsagent to get it. This gave us exercise as well, we were certain to have a paper to have at breakfast. We actually pulled the paper apart so we could both read it at the same time. Recently my husband passed away and I now only have the Mercury for company at breakfast ( I still walk up to get it) this gives me a social outing (seeing the girls at the Newsagents) each day as well as a newspaper. How can I set up a lap top on the brekky table as my phone doesn’t have the internet? Then I’m in the house all day- no walk- no incentive.
How do I find out about...?
- Deaths, funerals, marriages, and births
- Rural Weekly information
- The local news when we have no computer
- What's on tele (TV Guide)
- Clubs and organisation news
- Community member achievements
- Kids doing sports, drama and singing.
- Who is starting year 1 and finishing year 12
- How our neighbours celebrate anniversaries and special birthdays
With this ever change world getting more reliant on technology, why is it ok to say to our Elders to get over it and learn?
Why can’t the modern generation be
inconvenienced and made to buy the printed version, it might help the teenagers
with spelling and reading?
I did
not grow up with computers like my children & grandchildren and they can do
all the things for me that need to be done online except bring me a paper every
morning. They don’t live in Mackay. Why punish me?
I have
friends that do not even own a computer yet they keep up with everything going
on in the world, through the printed newspaper.
I have
a friend who was house bound by an illness before the COVID 19 and she said the
online version was selective everything that was in the printed version was not
on her phone. Also the obituaries were not up to date she wanted to
know when people’s funerals were on not when they had been.
No-one
is forced to buy the printed Mercury so why are the elderly being forced to get
the paper and read it online
I don’t
have a computer, took a months trial using my prepaid phone but it used up too
much data.
I like
looking up current events, what’s on in Mackay, weather and animals to adopt at
the pound.
The
newspaper is more that just the "news" in connects the whole of
community.
Now that's news!
Leanne Simpson, Membership/ICT, Soroptimist International of Mackay
Contact: simackayconnect@gmail.com
0428 181 824
