New media sites cope with plunging market
IT HASN’T BEEN an easy time for news media sites. The main revenue stream for such businesses is advertising. In addition to the April 2000 Nasdaq crash, which slowly zapped dot-coms’ ad budgets, the general economic downturn has curtailed advertising.
The effects of this are seen everywhere. News Corp. has laid off 450 online staff. CNN said it would cut 400, or 10% of its staff, a third of them coming from CNN.com and CNNfn.com. New York Times Digital has let go 116 people so far this year.
Another result is the news media companies have been seeking to cut costs by bringing their separate online divisions back into the fold of the main company. (They usually couch such moves in terms of better integrating their content.) CNN has consolidated its Web and old media divisions, breaking up CNN Interactive. News Corp. announced a similar plan to break up its online group, News Digital Media, and fold its parts
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