The following is from a post by Philip M. Stone at followthemedia.org:

With companies like Gannett and McClatchy, the two largest US newspaper publishers, slashing away at just about anything that moves these days there are plenty of signs that their boardrooms are convinced there is no light at the end of the tunnel, and there can be no question that Wall Street’s problems are also the problems for newspapers, too.

That’s really a double whammy that Wall Street has dealt newspapers – first it downgraded newspaper shares so much (how much short selling was in there?) that newspapers valuations on the market are ludicrously low, and now that Wall Street is getting its comeuppance, newspapers suffer again because if advertisers can’t gain access to credit, lines of credit and all the rest, then they’re going to pull in on what they spend, and that means less advertising spending, especially for traditional media. It’s as simple and cruel as that.

This post also includes a reference to last Friday’s layoffs at the Post-Dispatch. (For some reason, Stone thinks Mr. Shannon is actually Ms. Shannon!!) Read the full post here.