weeks - 10:59 pm on Mar 30, 2005 (gmt 0)

Communitynews has it right.

Publishers have got to do something because online is seriously hurting their print. Part of the thinking is that, well, heck if I'm going to subscribe, I'll get the print. (At least some will do that.)

I have a paper with a web site. We only put a couple of article on web so as to drive the classified traffic. Otherwise, people have to get the paper.

This report was released by Borrell Associates today.

WHAT LOCAL WEB SITES EARN: 2005 SURVEY Newspapers, TV and radio station Web sites experienced strong revenue growth in 2004 as they held onto half of all locally spent online advertising. Newspapers remained the leader, generating nearly $1.2 billion from their sites. TV sites saw nearly 60% revenue growth at $119 million, and radio stations suddenly awakened to the opportunity in 2004, nearly doubling their Internet ad revenues at $44 million. This 38-page report details the results of our annual local online advertising survey. This year’s survey included 2,177 sites operated by newspapers, TV stations, radio stations and local pure-play companies.

Now, you can sorta turn that on its head: How many of those dollars would have gone to the paper anyway? If you look at the data, a lot (over 40 percent) of the local ad traffic is done with pure web plays.

I'm all for subscriptions. Do it!