Paul Gillian opens a provocative article:

The near-total collapse of the American newspaper industry as we know it is inevitable. Anything newspapers could have done to stop it should have been done years ago (Slate recently wrote that newspapers saw this coming in the mid-70s). All the social, demographic and economic trends are lined up against the industry. Over the next decade, there will be agonizing rounds of layoffs, consolidation and bankruptcies. It will be painful to watch, but it will be a necessary process for the industry to reinvent itself.

His piece will make traditionalists uncomfortable, and his speculation may be extreme, but there is an essential truth in his vision of the future of journalism that must be considered. Read the whole thing.