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Since the advent of television news, newspapers have been struggling.  Sales have been slowing, circulation and staffs shrinking, with more and more small town papers dying out.  Some would call print news a dying business.

The Internet boom since the 1990’s threatened to be the death sentence for newspapers, but instead many of them have looked at it as an opportunity to adapt to the changing world.  Recently, newspapers’ websites have become an even better and more interactive source of news than their print counterparts.  In addition to the Internet hallmark of posting breaking news in real time, newspapers have been adding blogs by their most popular journalists and commentators, podcasts, audio and video, and a growing number of interactive features that allow readers to connect with one-another and discuss the news.

While it’s true that print sales and circulations have been steadily declining, web revenue has been pouring in more and more.

That is, until now.

After over four years of growth, online revenue for newspapers has ground to a halt and have dropped 2.4% from this time last year.

Newspapers still earn only a fraction of their revenues from their online presence, so many smaller newspapers have been in trouble anyway.  Still, this can not be a good sign for the future of newspapers in this country and around the world.  Unless this trend can be turned around significantly, I have a feeling that only the big metropolitan and national newspapers will survive the Internet Age.

Via [The New York Times]