Los Angeles  - "Black Monday." That's how the trade magazine Editor & Publisher chose to headline its story about the demise of the Tribune Co - one of the most august and profitable newspaper companies in the United States.

The owner of the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune and a host of other papers and TV properties, the company filed for bankruptcy protection Monday, unable to meet payments on a growing mountain of debt.

The company's situation was unusual. Tribune Co was saddled with debt when it was bought out by billionaire investor Sam Zell last year in a highly leveraged deal.

But its precarious financial situation was exacerbated by the same crippling factors that are threatening the entire US newspaper industry.

Those challenges are well known by newspaper executives, journalists and readers alike. The internet has poached millions of newspaper subscribers, especially the crucial younger audience that gets its news online and to a lesser extent from TV.

Advertisers have followed the eyeballs, but because the internet is still an unproven medium, they pay far less for ads on newspaper web sites than they used to for print ads. At the same time, classifieds, once the bread and butter of newspaper advertising, have migrated almost totally online.

Now, local newspapers' advertising mainstays - banks, car dealers and real estate agents - have been hardest hit by the current recession, cutting back even more on their expenditures.

Since 2005 alone, ad revenues have plummeted more than 21 per cent, from 35.1 billion dollars in the first three quarters of 2005 to 27.8 billion dollars in the first three quarters of 2008.

In October, audit figures showed that daily newspaper circulation was continuing its steep decline: slipping 4.6 per cent from last year.

No one is immune from this downturn. The New York Times, which saw its circulation drop 3.5 per cent, was reported Monday to be mortgaging its fancy new headquarters to meet its cash flow requirements, while pillars of the journalistic establishment such as the Rocky Mountain News of Denver, Colorado, and The Miami Herald are being touted for sale with few buyers showing interest.

"It has been, to say the least, the perfect storm," said Zell, who pledged to keep Tribune Co's publications up and running.

"A precipitous decline in revenue and a tough economy have coupled with a credit crisis, making it extremely difficult to support our debt. All of our major advertising categories have been dramatically impacted. Our challenges are consistent with those facing all media companies, and an increasing number of companies across a variety of industries today."

Tribune Co journalists struggled to put a brave face on the bankruptcy, pointing out that the major pieces of the conglomerate were still all cash-flow positive.

"Seeing your employer and 'bankruptcy' in the same headline does get your attention," journalist Steve Chapman wrote on the Chicago Tribune website. "But I'm no more worried today than I was before this development. Chapter 11 isn't my idea of a good time, but it's not as dire as it sounds, and it won't stop us from putting out the paper every day."

As for addressing the structural faults in the US newspaper industry, there is little good news.

One strategy used by Media News Group is to buy up a bunch of local papers in the same region and then merge departments like sports desks, business desks, print shops and advertising to slash production and editorial costs. The system has worked so far in the San Francisco Bay area, and there is talk that the company could buy the Los Angeles Times, the Orange County Register and the San Diego Tribune to attempt the same change.

The consensus is that newspapers will survive, albeit in a different form, and perhaps with only one daily publication serving each city, spelling the demise of the last few, old-fashioned competing papers left.

Although the print newspaper is going to face changes, "it will always be around," said media magnate Rupert Murdoch in a lecture last month.

"Too many journalists seem to take a perverse pleasure in ruminating on their pending demise," he said. Newspapers are already a "source that people can trust," Murdoch said, giving them an advantage over new media such as bloggers.

Newspapers must be delivered in a variety of ways that are "flexible" for readers, evolving from a "physical item" into "news brands," said Murdoch, a publisher who within the industry is both reviled for his ruthlessness and admired for his success.

Journalists need to be "excited by the opportunity" that an online medium provides, he argued, because the newspaper will continue to maintain its power and relevance "around society and the world." (dpa)