From CP via CTV.ca:

Don't believe everything you read about the imminent death of newspapers: robust growth in online advertising sales offset a mild decline in print ad revenue for Canadian papers last year, an industry trade group reported Monday.

The Canadian Newspaper Association said total 2007 revenues for the country's newspapers, including online operations, slipped 0.8 per cent to $3.6 billion.

Print advertising revenues fell by 2.4 per cent while online revenues increased 29 per cent over 2006.

"This is in sharp contrast to the U.S., where a contracting economy helped drive print ad revenues to the biggest year-over-year fall in more than half a century,'' the association noted.

Canadian newspaper circulation sales were down 1.2 per cent in 2007 to $808.9 million, after rising 3.8 per cent the previous year.

In the United States, print advertising revenues fell 9.4 per cent last year to $42 billion, according to the Newspaper Association of America -- the steepest drop since the NAA began keeping its tally in 1950. U.S. online advertising growth was 18.8 per cent in 2007, down from 31.4 per cent in 2006.

"The real story is how well we are holding our own in an age of global media disruption,'' stated Anne Kothawala, president of the Canadian Newspaper Association.