The digital revolution roiling all media in societies plugged into the Internet is having a profound effect on journalism across the world. Paper has become the stone tablet of our time, not quite as hefty in weight but in other respects as cumbersome.

The effect of the digital revolution, however, is not universally even. Economies that are still rapidly developing will feel it less than those that are more mature. China seems to be launching newspapers or magazines almost every other week. In the US, in contrast, they seem to be folding or changing ownership almost constantly, usually in downward spirals.

Perhaps the digital revolution is hitting hardest in the US, where the media are accorded a special role. The towering importance of the news media in the US political system is well known but not often emulated around the world. It's the rare government that would welcome a media powerful enough to topple it, as The Washington Post helped to do to former US president Richard Nixon in August 1974.