So far, newspapers have made less of the Internet than they might have. Although they are the logical owners of a range of on-line categories from news to classified advertisements, the top-ranked newspaper on-line is only 37th among World Wide Web sites in visitors each month, according to the market research and analysis firm Jupiter Media Metrix. The stock market reflects that missed opportunity: despite last year’s market correction, Yahoo!—a Web portal that offers news and other features—created almost twice as much shareholder value during the past five years as did the six leading US newspaper groups combined.

Fortunately for newspapers, novel technologies—wireless and fixed broadband—will reset the clock for all e-businesses, giving another chance to companies that missed the boat on the narrowband Internet (Exhibit 1). In much of Europe and Asia, mobile telephones are already far more common than home personal computers with Internet connections. These mobile devices can now access information, from stock prices to movie schedules, that until recently was easiest to find in newspapers and other print mass media.

How can newspapers protect and indeed expand their share of the market, broadly defined, as the demand for information through wireless devices grows, eroding the...