State of the News Media (Project)

Data and trends about key sectors in the U.S. news media industry

The pace of change has accelerated. In the last year, the trends reshaping journalism didn’t just quicken, they seemed to be nearing a pivot point.

The newspaper’s Web site, the internal report began, was now 10 years old. “Its stated strategy was to be an indispensable information retailer,” complete with “news, listings, reviews, databases,” and more.

The newspaper’s Web site, the internal report began, was now 10 years old. “Its stated strategy was to be an indispensable information retailer,” complete with “news, listings, reviews, databases,” and more.

Is the newspaper industry dying? Not now. On an average day, roughly 51 million people still buy a newspaper, and 124 million in all still read one.1

In 2006, the Internet as a platform for news continued to expand and mature, with more options offered to citizens than ever before. But with that have come nuances, some shaking out, and signs that not all elements of online news are growing equally.

It was the year people had been waiting for in network news.

Cable TV news is maturing. The medium that changed journalism at the end of the last century is no longer a new technology, with all the growth, experimentation, controversy and sense of zeitgeist that entails.

Local TV news, long America’s most popular information medium, is hardly proving immune to the revolution changing journalism.

After a decade of speculation that technology might render the news weekly obsolete, the field heading into 2007 seems at long last on the cusp of genuine change – especially among the biggest titles.

In 2006 the transformation of radio into something broader — audio — accelerated.