The major issue facing newspapers right now is their declining revenue. As consumers move more and more to the Internet and broadcast and cable news sources, advertisers are spending more of their money on those media instead of on newspapers. As revenue continues to decline, newspapers are forced to reduce their staff and budgets in order to remain profitable while also offering robust Web presences. Reducing staff can have a negative effect on the quality of reporting at the newspaper. While newspaper Web sites do cut down on some costs of buying and printing paper, online ad revenues have not been as high as hoped and only make up about 13 percent of a newspaper’s total ad revenue. This leaves newspapers with less revenue, fewer staff, and fiercer competition to attract readers.

In the early days of online news, many newspapers made the mistake of giving away their content for free. Now, newspapers are establishing paywalls and charging their readers a fee to access online content. The Wall Street Journal was an early, and successful, adopter of the paywall. The New York Times started their paywall in 2011 and charges their most loyal readers for unlimited access on various platforms.