Seems the market has fully digested last week’s news that online ads are falling at newspaper sites. Worse, MNI and others appear to be cannabalizing online sales in order to prop up print revenue. This is eating your seed corn.
But the exec level and the publishers still do not seem to get it. Here Jeff Jarvis guts the idea of a closed-door rescue summit planned by the American Press Institute this week. No doubt MNI reps will attend.
Absent some major change in the way newspapers do business — and assuming the economy remains weak during 2009 — it is hard to see how current operations can continue into 2010.
Update: Jarvis’ dogged attempts to drag newspapers into the future get slammed by the rear-guard over at Slate, who sure enough blame “markets” for the cruel fate of papers. Jarvis responds.
