One answer could be that newspaper publishers themselves created their own undoing. Starting 1996, all the news that was fit to print was given away for free using a business model that was wholly advertising-supported. This approach worked for a while, with newspaper advertising revenue topping out in 2006 at $64 billion.
What followed, however, was stagnation and decline. By 2011, advertising revenue from both digital and traditional sources dropped to less than $25 billion. Clearly, radical measures were needed to preserve the industry.
