Newspaper association press release buries the bad news

Today's Newspaper Association of America (NAA) press release:

Online newspaper advertising jumps 19 percent in 2007

Spending on newspaper Web sites grew to 7.5 percent of all newspaper ad spending last year

They helpfully include a link to 50+ years of data. A more informative summary:

Newspaper print revenue down 9.4%; the worst year on record

Online revenue growth drops below 19% (from 31% in 2005 & 2006)

I suppose one shouldn't hold an NAA press release to the standards of journalism claimed by NAA member papers....

Hat tip: Editor & Publisher. But, no link from me since they neglected to link to the NAA press release or data. Yet another drawback of the tired old media in comparison to blogs.

For example, Joseph Weisenthal of paidContent.org links to both in his writeup.