Wed, August 02, 2006
Has the online news growth hit a wall? Yes, it's clear that far more Americans use the Internet to get their news than a decade ago. But, what's not being talked about is that the rate of the online news audience growth is slowing rapidly.
According to the study by the Pew Research Center, nearly one in three Americans regularly used the Internet to get their news in 2006, compared to one in 50 in 1996. That number is about the same as it was two years ago.
It's not just online news that's facing growth issues.
The study also pointed out that four in 10 Americans reported reading a newspaper "yesterday," down from 50 percent a decade ago and down from 71 percent reported by a Gallup survey in 1965. "Even the highest estimate of daily newspaper readership -- 43 percent for both print and online readers -- is still well below the number reading a print newspaper on a typical day 10 years ago," the study said.
So both online news and newspaper seem to be facing issues gaining new readers. Maybe it's not the delivery mechanism that's the problem.
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