More than 45 percent of the newspaper market share in Switzerland is made up by free titles, and growing competition from those titles may have been one of the reasons paid weekly Das Stadtblatt, in Winterthur, moved to a free Sunday distribution beginning this year, Newspaper Innovation reported Thursday.

Five national titles in the German-speaking part of Switzerland are free, while two titles are free in the French speaking part. Winterthur, home of Das Stadtblatt, is located northeast of Zurich.

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Web users in Korea will able to access more free security programmes beginning in April, as NHN Corp., which runs Naver, the country's most popular portal, announced Wednesday it will provide a real-time antivirus programme for free in partnership with local web security firm Ahn Lab.

Naver will offer the programme as part of its “PC Green” user service, The Korea Herald reported Thursday.

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HT Media Ltd. reported a 10 percent net profit rise in the quarter of October through December in 2007 from the same period the year before, due to better advertising revenue growth, the newspaper publisher announced Thursday.

The New Delhi-based publisher of English newspaper Hindustan Times reported a net profit of 369 million rupees on net sales of 3.2 billion rupees between October and December of last year, while sales rose 16 percent.

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The Chicago Tribune announced Thursday it will expand its community journalism Web site coverage to Chicago's southwest and western suburbs.

Officials at Triblocal.com said the expansion plan will start this week, which includes 13 more suburbs.

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For Swedish young people, digital devices, such as the Internet and mobile phones, top the list of things they cannot live without, according to research and consulting firm Kairos Future.

Computers top the list among Swedes ages 16 to 25-years-old, while Internet and mobile phone follow. Among those 24 to 45-years old, TV is on the top of the list, with mobile phones and fixed phones on the second and the third. For those between ages 46 and 65, fixed phones, cars and radios top three things they cannot live without.

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The Guardian in the United Kingdom has been exceptionally successful in using its on-line presence to reach new audiences and develop advertising opportunities. Its traffic has topped 18 million visitors per month, it is read by as many people overseas as it is at home (particularly in the US), and its overall weekly reach in the UK is 25 percent higher than it would be with newspaper sales alone.

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Giving evidence to a UK Lord's Committee on Media Ownership and News, The Sun Editor Rebekah Wade said a newspaper's online platform can not yet replicate the print version's revenue, and that The Sun's Internet revenue will become “significant in 14 or 15 years time.”

“Long-term I can't be detailed and say this percentage will come from the Internet but it will become significant in 14 to 15 years time. Right now the newspaper makes the money,” Wade told the committee.

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The Bakersfield Californian newspaper will begin outsourcing its printing operation in mid-March, a move that will cut 34 jobs at the newspaper's publishing centre.

The printing will be done by Nevada-based Brad Moseley Inc.

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