VITAMEDIAS
Smaller U.S. newspapers last to get caught in Web: They have embraced the Internet, even though using it loses money for many of them.
Fewer than 100 of the 1,400 U.S. dailies and several hundred community weeklies have resisted setting up news sites on the Internet, or in some cases abandoned ones they started.
But newspapers that publish only with ink and paper are dwindling by the week, with about 2,200 now online.
The recent converts are succumbing to pressure from customers while devising ways to avoid losing money from the start, unlike larger publishers who poured vats of cash into a future that never arrived as planned.
And as often with technology, the laggards have benefited from the trial and error of the pioneers.
Small newspapers that have recently added Web sites have been more aggressive in seeking paid subscriptions for them.
Because of software innovations, papers need little time and scant manpower to reformat news and ad files to accommodate the Internet - a far cry from years ago when media chains added hundreds of electronic employees they later had to let go.