By David Renaii
The News & Observer
Published: 9/22/2006
Excerpt:
Four free newspapers produced by The News & Observer Publishing Co. have begun selling front-page ads to boost revenue.
The
publications are the Cary News, Chapel Hill News, Durham News and
Eastern Wake News. The first front-page ad is scheduled to appear
Saturday in the Durham News.
Newspapers across the country are
suffering through revenue declines as advertisers shift more of their
dollars to the Internet. That economic pressure has pushed some papers -- including industry leaders such as The Wall Street Journal and The
New York Times -- to begin selling ads that run in previously
sacrosanct space on the front page, or the first page of certain
sections.
The News & Observer Publishing Co.'s flagship daily
newspaper,
The News & Observer, doesn't accept advertising on the
front page and isn't planning to do so, president and publisher Orage
Quarles III wrote in a note to readers that is scheduled to appear
Saturday in the
Durham News. This year, however,
The N&O began
selling ads on sticky notes affixed to the front page -- and has
received some reader complaints. ...
... Bob Steele, an ethics expert at the Poynter Institute, a nonprofit
resource for journalists, said he understands the business realities
that are pushing more papers to sell premium space that previously was
reserved for news.
But Steele said he finds it disconcerting from a journalistic perspective.
"When you lose a chunk of your news hole, it symbolically and substantively sends a message," he said.
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