The Monday Note has published one of the closest-to-cogent arguments yet on the difficulties facing the economics of the newsroom as it transforms. Essentially the argument goes; The compact newsroom creating print and Web won't pay off because the the revenue won't follow the traffic in amounts significant enough to bear the freight.
"News is no longer able to sustain itself," the authors say. New niche sites to repurpose content and new forms of cross-subsidies will be necessary, including corporate communications work for the newsroom. As for the viability of public trading, Monday Note says it'll be better to take companies private, because any cross-subsidy will be attacked by the market.
