Crystal ball time: Good story on journalism's future

Nice analysis of the past and future of the journalism biz in the San Diego Union-Tribune a little while back. Here's the top:

By Thomas Kupper
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
There was a time when newspapers were a monopoly business, when people had no good way to get information other than to subscribe, and when businesses that wanted to promote their products had little choice but to buy newspaper ads.
Philip Meyer says that period is gone forever, and he knows when it ended: 1923.

It's a good read, talking with experts about

• 85 years of moving away from mass media to niche media;
• the "decoupling of news and advertising";
• why half of our newspapers will go under in the next decade;
• local and national papers' potential for increased audience;
• and how the journalism biz as a whole may survive but not be nearly as fat:

“It will be a good business compared to the average business,” (UNC professor) Meyer said. “But it will be a poor business compared to the easy money that newspapers used to make. It will be good enough that someone will want to do it.”