Quote, unquote: Dubious web metrics

Next time someone uses web metrics to tell you that print is dead I have some advice. Laugh.
-- John Duncan on his blog Inksniffer

The blog item is about how misleading and slapdash is the use of comparative data about online and print readership. If you can work through the item with Duncan, who was formerly managing editor of The Observer, as he parses data about the respective readership of the Guardian and its online cousin , you may come to similar conclusions.

As Duncan says:

Internet metrics substantially exaggerate the importance of the newspaper web audience. Would you be so keen to abandon print to its fate if you knew that despite 10 years of growth, your web site may only have 30% of the reach of your printed newspaper in the market where you can attract advertisers. And that at current rates of growth and decline it could be 2020 or 2030 before the two are even level with each other?