PressEthic

It seems there is no way for newspapers to avoid the digital revolution.

According to a study conducted by a research firm Nielsen/NetRatings the trend of reading newspapers online is on the rise. Surprise Surprise!

Even in light of all the latest scandals, I still feel that newspapers are the best source of information. The most important component of the newspaper is not the form it is delivered in, but the content. As long as the content is not being sacrificed, I think I can part with the broadsheet.

Among online newspapers surveyed, NYTimes.com was the top site, with 11.4 million visitors in October 2005. The paper recently reported that subscribers for its fee-based site have reached 270,000 since its introduction less than two months ago. USAToday.com and WashingtonPost.com came in at No. 2 and No. 3 with 10.4 million and 8.1 million visitors, respectively. LATimes.com and SFGate.com rounded out the top five with 3.9 million visitors each.

At least newspaper readers are showing consistency –paper or online, the times and post etc. are still drawing the most readership.

Now I am just waiting for these sites to start charging for their service. This trend seems to be going in the same direction as so many other free online services.

I remember when a service called Net2Phone allowed free international dialing all over the world. Once they had users hooked, they cut off the free service and started charging.

I get so annoyed when I am denied access to archived material or websites ask me to ‘register’ in order to access information—it will be quite tiresome if and when that happens with current news.