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For almost two centuries, newspapers have been on a journey into the mass market which gave them scale, reputation and profit but which has now reached its end. They mostly abandoned dependence on subscriptions and instead sold below production cost as a way to attract readers to sell to advertisers.

Since the Internet took off, the print media's advertising-supported business model has suffered. In the past 20 years, newspapers' ad profits have fallen by about 80%, while circulation has roughly fallen by half. Though online traffic has risen, profit from digital advertising has failed to offset (抵消) the profit draining out of print. "Platforms have become the new kings of the media landscape," says the Competition and Markets Authority, a regulator.

This power shift has led newspapers in many countries to turn to authorities for help. Partly because they have, by their very nature, a loud voice, they have generated sympathy. How much they deserve it is another matter.

The world is filled with businesses torn apart by the digital revolution without anyone rushing to the rescue. Why are newspapers different? One argument is that a thriving press supports grass-roots journalism, which, though often loss-making, supports fairness and equality. That is reasonable. Yet it is mixed with other motivations, such as the desire to choke the tech giants. The result is a range of interventions aimed at putting the pressure on big tech.

Mindful of the outcry, big tech is offering a handout, promising $1bn over three years to newspapers to provide news content for its site. Some publishers saw it as an unstated admission that big tech should pay for news.

If anything, the gratitude for big tech's generosity shows how desperate newspapers are for payment of any kind. More to the point, it will not change the underlying economics of the global newspaper industry. That is because the ad-funded business model was living on fumes even before the Internet ate the world this century. Data show that newspapers have been losing share of ad dollars to TV since the 1950s - long before the web. Circulation has also fallen relative to population, suggesting that profits were supported by economic and population growth, not because the industry was producing a more popular product.

Claims that the tech giants are robbing newspapers for profit sound far-fetched, too. The real failure is that papers have lost control of distribution to platforms, making it harder to monetise the traffic. This is a mistake some content industries, such as video-streaming and music, have avoided. Noreover, some of the advertising dollars made by big tech came from bringing new firms into the market, rather than taking online advertisers from newspapers.

So ignore the complaining of old-media companies in distress and look instead at how some newspapers have already adapted to the digital invasion. Also some digital publications with a newsworthy focus are thriving. The question of who pays for public-interest journalism remains unanswered. But few think it ought to be tech giants. That would "undermine the principles of an independent press".