U.S. President Barack Obama on Sunday expressed concern for the financial future of the U.S. newspaper and stressed the importance of journalism in the American democracy, in a meeting with the editors of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and The Blade of Toledo, the Post-Gazette reported Sunday.

"Journalistic integrity, you know, fact-based reporting, serious investigative reporting, how to retain those ethics in all these different new media and how to make sure that it's paid for, is really a challenge," Obama said. "But it's something that I think is absolutely critical to the health of our democracy."

Obama expressed concern about the effects of mass staff reductions and in some cases the closure of newspapers, leaving journalism in the hands of amateur bloggers, according to the Post-Gazette.

"I am concerned that if the direction of the news is all blogosphere, all opinions, with no serious fact-checking, no serious attempts to put stories in context," he said, "that what you will end up getting is people shouting at each other across the void but not a lot of mutual understanding."

The President was aware of the issues surrounding the generation of revenue from online content as readers continue to expect to access newspapers' Web sites for free.

"What I hope is that people start understanding if you're getting your newspaper over the Internet, that that's not free. And there's got to be a way to find a business model that supports that." He also said that he would "be happy to look at," proposals for government bailout packages for newspapers, although he was yet to receive detailed submissions.