On-Line Newspaper Availability: A Review of Literature

The digital revolution represented by the presence of newspapers on the Internet is not regarded by Johnson (2001) as particularly revolutionary. What is different about online news, in the view of Johnson, is that it simply represents a new customized format for the delivery of the contents of a traditional or weekly newspaper. As the use of the Internet expanded, scholars in journalism and mass communication began to worry that news consumption by the general public would be limited to a few topics ordered from custom news sources and consequently, that citizens' knowledge of public issues would decline (Johnson, 2001).

Johnson (2001) believes that these fears were premature and that the Internet allows people to access more rather than less news than th

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are few ethical codes that appear to apply to online newspapers and this is a problem for readers and publishers alike. Thompson and Wassmuth (2001a) present a content analysis of newspaper practice regarding the accessibility of online banner advertising. The study provided evidence that three out of four banner ads found in online newspapers failed to present accessible content by using alternative text in the image tags of online banner ad images. This study highlighted the fact that online newspaper ads are often less useful to readers and advertisers than is true with print advertising. Dibean and Garrison (2001) examined U.S. daily newspapers' use of available technologies, including multimedia and interactivity for the development of World Wide Web sites. They also looked at how the three market geographic types (local, regional, and national online newspapers) varied in their use of Web site design features. The study found that most online newspapers have adopted innovations such as links to related information and consumer services such as searchable classifieds. However, in all three newspaper types, an emerging emphasis on e-commerce as opposed to news was observed. In a study by McAdams (2000) online editors
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 10062
Approximate Pages = 40 (250 words per page)