Peoria market shows newspapers' web sites lead

Online presentation of news doesn't happen in a vacuum, according to Peoria Journal star business editor and media critic Steve Tarter. Newspapers provide the bulk of content online.

"Hardly a day doesn't go by when you don't hear something about the print media's fall from grace," he writes. "But the fact is that papers continue to inform in both print and online editions."

He quotes author Eric Alterman, also a professor of English and journalism at Brooklyn College, as bemoaning changes in presentation: "So long as our society treats the disappearance of newspapers as strictly a business matter - with no implications for the future health of our democracy - this problem will continue to worsen," Alterman wrote.

But Tarter points out that newspapers' newsroom are still the main source for the journalism the audience seeks.

"The newspaper remains," Tarter says, "just like the bulletin board that somehow still finds a place in this digital world."