Will Seattle Post-Intelligencer survive on the Web?

The Hearst Corp. announced last Friday that it has put up the Seattle Post-Intelligencer for sale. If no buyer is found within 60 days from that day, it will either cease publication altogether or become an online-only operation. It seems that latter scenario is the more likely of the two, according to this Seattle P-I news report:

Today’s dismal climate for newspapers means no buyer is likely to emerge, several sources said. That could mean an end to the rival newsrooms and editorials of the P-I and The Seattle Times that have offered Seattleites a choice of food for thought for decades.

So can the Seattle P-I survive on the Web? No, says All Things Digital’s Peter Kafka:

Quantcast pegs the paper’s traffic at 2.6 million uniques. That would keep a blog with a handful of writers and editors afloat – if it had a specific niche, like, say technology news. And if it had a national audience to sell to advertisers. But a generalized news site for a local audience? No one’s figured out how to do it yet, and a recession probably isn’t the time to solve that riddle.

A bit more optimistic is Todd Bishop of TechFlash, who offers 10 steps for saving the P-I as an online-only publication. Two of his more notable recommendations include adding paid community bloggers and streamlining the advertising process by giving businesses more control over choosing where their ads will appear.

I’m rooting for the P-I to succeed, and think it has a chance. It has a great website, and its neighborhood-focused Webtowns pages and Readers Blogs are already providing the sort of interesting, well-organized local coverage that will be key to its success.