by Orrin Konheim

Created on: June 12, 2009   Last Updated: April 04, 2011

In his chat with Washington Post readers, Pulitzer Prize winner Eugene Robinson remained remarkably optimistic about the future of newspapers, but acknowledged the gravity of the matter. First radio and then television failed to kill newspapers (as had been predicted), but this is a more serious challenge, wrote Robinson.

The common perception among many for the decline of the newspaper industry is that the internet is a better product and is taking away from the newspapers' readership. While this is partially true, the main culprit is the way in which the internet provides easier access for advertisers. The growing popularity of sites like craigslist has significantly lowered the demand for ads. In addition, the slumping economy and the relative ease of the internet as an alternative source of news has led many people who are strapped for cash to cut the luxury of buying the print edition.

When the economy is bad and the luxury of a newspaper is one of the first costs to go, news stand sales and circulation decline, and as Robinson said, "It becomes a wobbly stool."

Many optimists in the industry note that more people are reading newspaper content than ever before as increasing web traffic on newspaper sites has created a net increase in readership. In addition, some of the drop in circulation has been intentional because papers are limiting their output to focus on where distribution is most profitable.

Newspaper circulation has been steadily in decline for several years but the drop increased by 80% in 2008 according to figures released by the Audit Bureau of Circulations. In April of 2009, the average drop in circulation was an astounding 7.1% in weekday sales.

The decline of newspapers is part of a larger shift in the creation of knowledge that some, like Andrew Keen, feel are having catastrophic effects. In his book, "Cult of the Amateur", Keen speaks of the negative externalities of web 2.0 as assaulting our economy, our culture, and our values. The problem of the current state of the internet where content is voluntarily created by users without compensation is that it prevents the people who are responsible for creating the information, from being compensated from their work. This will not benefit newspapers in any way either.

A good deal of the Pandora's box that newspapers currently find themselves in was created by the newspapers themselves who initially found it beneficial to put some of their content online. Analysts have warned in recent years

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