More and more professional reporters are creating their own websites or blogs to showcase their work. But even if you're a student or citizen journalist, you can use Gmail and Blogger, a free service from Google, to set up an online portfolio of your clips in just minutes.

Signing up for a Blogger account takes just a minute - just hit the "Create a Blog" button. And if you already use Google e-mail, just use your Gmail username and password to log into your account.

And remember, a portfolio that's nothing but a collection of hyperlinks will look boring. Be sure to include plenty of photos and Graphics to create visual interest. You can use the pictures that originally appeared with your article, ones you take yourself, or even royalty-free images from services like Stock.xchng, as long as you observe all applicable copyright laws.

For instance, if you've written an article about the Facebook craze, you might use a stock photo of a person typing at a computer to illustrate it.

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You may have heard the terms "broadsheet" and "tabloid" being thrown around to describe different kinds of newspapers. So what's the difference?

Broadsheet refers to the most common newspaper format, which is typically 11 to 12 inches wide and 20 or more inches long. Many of the nation's most respected newspapers - The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall St. Journal, and so on - are broadsheet papers. Broadsheet papers are usually six columns across.

In the strict technical sense, tabloid refers to a type of newspaper that typically measures 11 X 17 inches, which is smaller and narrower than a broadsheet newspaper. Since tabloids are smaller, their stories tend to be shorter than those found in broadsheets. And while broadsheet readers tend to be upscale suburbanites, tabloid readers are often working class residents of big cities.

Indeed, many city dwellers prefer tabloids because they are easy to carry and read on the subway or bus.

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It seems clear: The future of news is online, and printed newspapers appear headed for extinction.

But the picture isn't that simple. Printed newspapers make less money than they used to, but they're still far more profitable than news websites, and until that changes, papers will be around.

Meanwhile, news organizations, hit hard by the recession, are considering whether to start charging for their online content. And a battle is brewing between publishers that produce news stories and the aggregators who make money by linking to them.

Here you'll find the latest developments on all of this.

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