Newspapers are dying, but the news is thriving. By Jack Shafer

That high-pitched squealing you hear in the background is the sound of the American newspaper shrinking.

The Washington Post, the New York Times, the Boston Globe, the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, Newsday, the Philadelphia Inquirer, and scores of smaller papers have downsized their staffs in recent months. About 70 newsroom staffers and 100 non-newsroom employees are exiting the Post through the buyout door, according to the paper's June 1 account.

The physical product is shriveling as well. The Wall Street Journal will snip three inches from its width starting in 2007, adopting the liposuctioned profiles of the similarly slimmed-down Post, Los Angeles Times, and USA Today. This week the New York Times looked in the mirror and contemplated a diet, saying it might reduce page width after having already switched to lighter-weight paper stock.*