Future of Newspapers: Profitless? Go Wireless
• WiredIt's undeniable that the going rate for information on the internet
is "free." That's meant big trouble for newspapers, which have seen
nearly all of their traditional roles usurped by better, faster, free
online services over the past few years. If a newspaper doesn't make
its content available gratis on the Web, it's irrelevant. If it does,
it's got nothing left to sell but fishwrap and inkstains.
The Wall Street Journal's publisher Les Hinton has called Google a "digital vampire," but even his paper, one of the last holdouts of subscription-based online content, has made its articles' full text accessible via Google searches. Using free content as bait for paying customers doesn't work for newspapers. And the revenue from internet advertising is less a stream than a dribble — nowhere near enough to support a robust paper (or paperless paper) on its own.