"The Internet is re-drawing the media landscape and will continue to do so for decades to

come, but traditional media will not be left out of the picture", argue two journalism professors from University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa. Ed Mullins, chairman of the Journalism Department, and Jim Stovall, the founder of Dateline Alabama, the news website of the College of Communication and Information Sciences, agree that the future of the web is still a mystery, but in the near future, it will serve more as a helpmate to traditional media.

"Nobody knows where the Web is taking us, but when it comes to journalism, old media will be dominant players in the new media game," Mullins believes. "Some rating services report that most Americans go to sites operated by old-line media when looking for news on the web."

Just as national old media dominate the Web at that level, local old media run mostly by news papers and, to a lesser degree, by television stations dominate those markets. Is there a pattern here？ Mullins and Stovall suggest that" At least in the first decade of the Web, newspaper companies dominate Web journalism ,because they specialize in news, and that gives them an advantage. Most readers browse through the websites for news and e-mail, a form. of person-to-person news, especially in the form. of chatting."

The reason for newspapers' dominance in web journalism, Stovall points out, is that they have the biggest investment in news. "The Birmingham News, for example ,with about 175 positions, has more journalists on its payroll than all of the state's broadcast, cable, and Web-only entities combined."

What role does the Internet play in journalism according to paragraph 1？

A．It dominates the media market.

B．It is likely to threaten the future of traditional media.

C．It becomes a helpful partner of print media.

D．It revolutionizes journalism.