The talk of gloom and doom in the newspaper industry as of late – newspaper after newspaper folding, or cutting staff, or dropping the number of editions it publishes a week – may turn some people off to the idea of going into the journalism field. After all, why spend all that time working and preparing for a career that could be over before it begins?

But don't let the state of the conventional newspaper put you off. Traditional paper and ink may fade away, but journalism won't.

CNN, in an analysis of the state of the newspaper business that was published this past week, noted that the desire for news hasn't gone anywhere. People are still going to want not only the big headlines of major events that broadcast news carries, but also the stories of local happenings, the in-depth coverage, the editorial analysis that only a newspaper can bring them.

It's just going to come in a different form, that's all.

One byproduct of the E-book wars that are rapidly brewing on the horizon is going to be a demand for content to put on those handy little devices, making it a natural home for the "cyberpaper." Once communities become fully wired, or major transportation systems start offering wifi on buses and trains, you may have a scenario where commuters pull out their Kindles to read the latest movie reviews or a preview of Sunday's big games the way they now unfold their local papers.

The cyberpaper has already made its presence known on the Internet, with some papers and magazines saying they're going online-only – The Christian Science Monitor was at the forefront of this movement, a move that allowed the paper to retain most of its staff and keep up the same level of coverage while cutting costs. It may be noted that the staffs of some conventional papers that closed, like the Rocky Mountain News, have made preliminary plans to set up cyberpapers.

So the journalist of tomorrow may have to be trained a bit differently than the ones of the past – knowledge of HTML may become as necessary as knowledge of Microsoft Word is today – but their services will still be needed. As long as people are making news, there will be a need to report and analyze it.

– Bonnie