Tragedy: The End of Newspapers

An Era of print in the US seems to be coming to a crashing close. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer has published its last edition today (Friday, March 20, 2009). The bloodline of a 146 year old newspaper has been smothered.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer: "SEATTLE P-I: 1863-2009
After 146 years, the P-I printed its final newspaper March 17. Review your memories of the P-I -- and ours
The final front page (PDF)"

Their last headline screams out: “You’ve meant the world to us” http://www.seattlepi.com/frontpage/SPI-20090317-A-001.pdf

The famously literate Seattle area is now a one newspaper town. NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF, (Published: March 18, 2009) has remarked/observed on this mortality:

Op-Ed Columnist - The Daily Me - NYTimes.com: "Some of the obituaries these days aren’t in the newspapers but are for the newspapers. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer is the latest to pass away, save for a remnant that will exist only in cyberspace, and the public is increasingly seeking its news not from mainstream television networks or ink-on-dead-trees but from grazing online." http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/19/opinion/19kristof.html?em

[PS. My comment on his New York Times blog is now posted]

Even the competition is not ecstatic during this funereal time: The Seattle Times Seattle Times Newspaper. The token balm that is applied is that a skeleton crew of 20 are going to run the P-I news operations from their web site.

Question: Who is responsible for the demise of Newspapers?

Hint: The information man who does not seem to read print himself has much to answer for. Stay tuned.
A Prize of Recognition for the person who sends in the correct answer (email me or post in the comments section). A bigger Recognition for your reasoning!
In a future blog, I will provide my take on this.