Newspaper websites on the rise

Just when you thought you’d heard the last of newspapers and their ilk, here come the latest Nielsen/NetRatings numbers. The number of people visiting newspaper websites in the first half of 2006 went up 31% over the previous period. USATODAY.com has the Reuters story here. From the article:

The study, released by the Newspaper Association of America, underscores the Internet’s importance to papers beset by falling circulation and advertising revenue in their print editions.

The average number of unique visitors to online newspaper sites in the first half was more than 55.5 million a month, the study said. That compares with 42.2 million a year earlier.

Even more stunning is the figure that page views at newspaper websites rose 52% for the same period. Page views is a key metric used to gauge traffic, and keep in mind that these are not MySpace-style inflated returns. Newspaper websites are doing well. The study also noted that the number of younger people visiting newspaper websites had gone up.

The full report can be downloaded in PDF format from this page.

In other news, I took Abigail to the airport this evening. She’s off to San Francisco for a bit. Hello, West Coast!