With each month, newspapers look less like a business and more like a lost cause. The crisis is acute in the US, where some newspaper groups are in Chapter 11 bankruptcy and there are questions over the long-term future even of venerable titles such as The New York Times and The Washington Post.
The degree to which the travails of papers are a threat to an informed democracy can be exaggerated, particularly by journalists. The internet has made print less profitable but has also made new forms of information-gathering and commentary possible. Bloggers get a bad press but low-cost publishing helps new sources to emerge.
Perhaps some of the reporting done up to now by for-profit papers will in future be funded by foundations or trusts. But the industry should not lose faith in the free market. When people really want or need something, they will pay for it, one way or another. If today’s publishers cannot convince their readers to do so, they will be overtaken by others that can.
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