Newspaper Carnage

Alan Mutter at Reflections of a Newsosaur analyzes seriously depressing data about the newspaper industry recently released by the Newspaper Association of America. As Mutter explains:

With three months to go in the worst year ever for newspapers, the drop in sales in the first three quarters of 2009 is roughly equal to the combined revenues for the last 12 months of Gannett and McClatchy Co. In other words, it's as though two of the largest publicly owned publishers in the land just fell off the face of the earth.

Ouch.

Our Republic needs a strong group of reporters gathering news and providing oversight over our government and institutions. Whether or not newspapers survive, we need to figure out how the reporting and editing can survive this carnage.