News Flash: More people get their news from the Net than from newspapers. While this will hardly count as news to most of our readers, the Pew Research Center seems surprised by the shift. In a survey of 1,489 adults in the U.S. conducted in early December, 40 percent said they get most of their national and international news from the Internet, compared to 35 percent from newspapers. The percentage of newspaper readers has been pretty steady since 2005. What’s changed is the number of people admitting they get their news from the Internet as well, up from 24 percent the last time the Pew Center asked this question in September, 2007.
TV still beats both as a news source, with 70 percent, but give it a couple more years and the Internet should overtake that as well. Among younger adults, those under 30, the Internet already ties TV as a news source at 59 percent for both. (Last year, TV beat the Internet among this age group, 68 percent to 34 percent, to give you a sense of how fast things can switch).
Have people’s reading habits really changed so much in just a year, or are Pew surveys a lagging indicator of reality?
And if the numbers are accurate, is this just another nail in the coffin of newspapers? Not exactly. What isn’t clear from the survey is how much of that Internet news comes from Websites run by newspapers.
The New York Times alone, for instance, operates the 16th most popular set of properties on the Web, although that does not seem to be helping much in the online advertising department. Even if newspapers grab a large share of the Internet news pie, that pie is just not as filling as a pie filled with more lucrative print ads. But as long as newspapers keep producing journalism worth reading (and adjust their business models accordingly), people will keep going to them for a portion of their news. It is just that they will read their news in their browsers instead of on paper.
Even on Christmas TC are working for those of us that sneak a browse. Great!
Yeh, lol.
This is the most obvious survey ever. Anyway, now that its confirmed, maybe newspapers will change their marketing efforts…
internet and the iphone is the paper industries worst enemy.
i think the pew was askew last year. im willing to bet it is even higher than they claim in 08. probably around 55-60%.
TruthLocator.com – it hurts
Does this mean that the media will respect bloggers a bit more now?
“40 percent said they get most of their national and international news from the Internet” –
“TV still beats both [Print + Internet] as a news source, with 70 percent” — Let’s see, now we have 110%? What happened Erick? Too much eggnog?
yeah, why don’t these numbers add up? “Percent” = “per” + “cent” = “in 100″ still, right?
The survey might have accepted multiple choices from the participants.
If that was indeed the case, then the sum total can exceed 100%!
I get ZERO PERCENT of my news from tv or newspapers… But then again, I live in Asia.
“Hardly count as news to most of our readers”
Since this graph clearly shows that people, only within the last year, began getting more of their news from the internet than from newspapers, doesn’t your quote, if true, demonstrate that your readers are “out of touch”?
My door man gives me leftover newspapers every night, so it is like a mystery bag of papers that I wake up to. I never know if I’ll have FT, WSJ, NYT or the locals. So, I read whatever he decides I should read that day.
Maybe I’m a dying breed, but I like a morning cup of coffee with a newspaper that gets ink all over my fingers. I like to feel the news in my hands. I still rip out interesting articles and send them to friends. I don’t find them on the Internet and forward them. I know I can, I just don’t.
TechCrunch is the only blog I read for news.
In trying to convert
In trying to convince my clients to migrate their spend away from print and direct marketing, I’m frequently asked to substantiate true middle-of-the-road audience metrics. Some marketers will not be swayed by anecdotal evidence, and it takes studies like the Pew one to get them to question the way they’ve been doing things.
I’ve noticed that I typically only look at the news that interests me personally on the internet,whereas in newspapers and TV, I pretty much read or watch everything they provide equally. I don’t think this is a good development. I’ll get my news in as many media as possible.
I think that newspapers industry will vanish in the coming decade. And the only way for those renowned newspapers to save their titles is by concentrating more online and smoothly moves all their business there.
It would helpful to see what online news sites people are going to. Newspaper articles still have considerable depth to their stories, so if the shift is going from newspapers to their respective online news sites, then the shift shouldn’t be all that dire. Of course, companies still need to find a way to make more net money but still…
The old newspaper model of providing news is doomed to fail. You can get the news in realtime from Twitter from people who are on the ground while things are happening. Full speed ahead with technology and the oblieration of the newspaper as we know it. (also newspapers are super dirty and non-hygenic and bad for the environment as well)
Happy New Year TC and readers !
merry xmas
I posted this on my blog awhile ago, and as a comment on Digg, but I will say this once more here for effect:
*Print* newspapers were made irrelevant years ago. The world is just now catching up. There is no possible reason to receieve news in a printed format. It is wasteful both for print and delivery and also not a timely way to receieve news. Countless times I’ve seen a story on blogs, Digg, Reddit, Twitter, StumbleUpon or even the newspaper’s own website – then chuckled to see it in print the next day. Print news obviously has no future, think about it:
* Print news dies quickly, isn’t even really “news” anymore by the time it prints in a digital age
* Digital news is searchable
* Digital news can be easily shared, linked to and archived
* Print newspapers are cumbersome, have irrelevant ads
* Online newsrooms have infinite space, archived content can be monetized forever
It is a dated idea to have someone deliver you news in paper form every morning. It’s another relic of the last century, and in the not too distant future we will think of print newspapers as quaint (many already do). Print magazines are an exact parallel, what a huge waste of money and energy when RSS is such a thing of beauty.
I’ll say its true however everything that is in the newspaper is not always available online especially when dealing with local news and even that may have occuried the past night.
That’s good news!
You may be interested to see that a lot of locally relevant news is now being distributed via blogs in India- such as who was allocated or not allocated govt housing in Delhi and so on. This is usually the kind of stuff that slips below the radar. I think we will see 2 areas of growth- opinion articles(as newspapers keep getting more sanitised or vulgarised) and micro-community news. Newspapers definitely need to rethink where they are heading, no offence. But this does not mean the end of the newspaper trade. They need to get more edgy and relevant. Look at your research more carefully- look for mini-segments and not broad strokes of data accumulation.
I still think TV is the best for complicated news or when you want some flavor to it.
Especially my blog!
the new mediea will take more percentage of the market. it’s for sure
I think that reading one news source or watching one news channel is the wrong way to go. As anyone might know, media outlets all have different ways of portraying the news. I really liked http://news.clipta.com for giving me multiple news sources to watch at once.
I think digital newspapers will be the main source of news in the web. Blogs will cover the opinion side of the news. But digital media are weaker in the online field with Google in front of them. Rules are different here. Probably Google will keep the investments based on roi and digital media will retain the branding stake of the buget… unless Google surprises us again with a new product for advertisers
online news is more refined, deep and (gulp) without common denominator thinking, there’s no turning back..
We get the local newspaper to use as kindling for the fireplace, but Newspapers online probably account for 90% of my news.
wow I hope the media and such will respect bloggers more…
It’s not that the reading habits have changed as much, but I believe that the major value comes in the speed of delivery. If a major event or news item occurs you have to wait until tomorrow to read it in a newspaper while a website update is instantaneous (additionally supported via RSS feeds).
Online dominance in news delivery will become even more apparent as data portability and mobile computing come to the forefront.
Its chaos for print media as Digital media getting better ,we are reading news from online and it tends to drops down markets of newspapers .I have to agree that we knowing news through online than with the newspapers
I think the Internet will surpass all news media in the near future. It’s the only place you can go with unbiased news. Granted you’ll probably migrate to what you want to hear but at least you have choices to hear everything.
I personally hated listening to the television. Fox news was always shoving stuff down my throat and most of which had no use to me. Plus you get tired of the hyperbole and propaganda.
As long as the net stays neutral I’ll look forward to our internet overlords delivering us fast news that we can email, im, or socialize on the fly.
What unbiased news ; there is no such thing as unbiased news once a person reads something they are biased and most websites are biased towards some stories you can not write an article without some personal opinion coming into it.
Here’s a good source to keep track of hot topics on web: http://www.followeb.com
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I’m always confused when I read posts that gleefully smirk at the decline of newspapers. We are at a crossroad where technology and truth meet. We will rue the day that in-depth reporting are replaced with tweets and objective thought is replaced with opinionated blogs. Just remember, YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR.
Wow, I never would have guessed!. Actually, I cannot remember the last time I actually picked up a print paper!
jess
http://www.privacy-tools.at.tc
the post is on the right spot
http://www.yout...h?v=763vmCrRBDg
Do all you newspaper haters realize that most of the national and international news on the web originates with print newspapers? It doesn’t just bubble up to the surface from a bunch of amateur bloggers.
I had this idea a few years back: Newspapers should consider creating something like a Digital Newspaper where you have some sort of device with an LCD screen that people buy and then get their news there… the device will be updated each 24 hours via satellite and will work just like a regular newspaper only with much more benefits as you will be able to read and leave comments, click on ads and go to advertisers site, editors will be able to correct/update stories on the fly, etc
Basically this will be a Kindle (Amazon’s eBook reader) for all things news.
Let me know what you guys think of this idea!? I personally think it has a lot of potential, judging by Kindle’s success…
instead of a kindle – just put it on a netbook with a text to audio speech synthesizer and photo slideshow.
Stan Oleynik, I do appreciate your thoughts. But I feel the News Channel does a better job these days. You tend to watch CNN rather to keep you updated with latest news from technology to Finance. Why do we need an extra gadget to do the same service.
Most people get their news from….newspapers that are online like the New York Times.
They don’t get it from Huff Post or Tech Crunch.
My problem with this survey is that it doesn’t cover the whole picture. What about local advertisement?
Just give the advertisers another year or two to catch up with the readership percentages. They’re slow to ‘get it’, but the transition is happening as we speak.
just can tell me .seo http://www.weig...tloss-about.com
Well, I guess the chances of reading newspaper will never drop down. I feel the survey would have been taken from people of age group between 25 – 50 and the answer would have been internet. But we do have to remember that there are many old people who dont access internet and still rely on TV and Newspapers.
May be 1489 adults taken participation in this survey is too less number to come to some conclusion.
What would be interesting to know is what proportion of internet news is from outside the digital versions of the same newspapers they would be reading offline. I.e. are people still reading news from the same sources, and if not to what extent are people embracing new news sources?
I still learn far more about the background to what’s happening in the world from a printed newspaper than the internet or TV. Internet and TV news is too focused on immediacy and what’s “breaking”, and they sacrifice depth of coverage to achieve this. A printed newspaper has time to research a story more deeply, and give a more considered opinion.
I wouldn’t want to lose internet or TV news. But I certainly wouldn’t want to lose printed newspapers either.
I get ZERO PERCENT of my news from tv or newspapers… But then again, I live in Asia