The Current Discussion: American newspapers are in dire financial straits. How are newspapers faring where you are? Are you concerned about the future of journalism in America or in your own country? What does that future look like?

Since the fall of socialism here in Central Europe, we have been hit hard by America's problems. We don't get much in the way of gifts or fancy foreign aid packages, but we do get oil shortages and terrorism scares. Newspapers in Hungary have to cope with the same declines as America's. Moreover, the small size of our country makes the problem more daunting.

But on the Internet, journalism is flourishing. The future lies there, in online papers and blogs. As a novelist, not a journalist, I admit to being less concerned - my favorite pastime is the reading (and writing) of books, and less threatened. Although I know that the book, as such, may also be an endangered species.

What can be done? Journalists can improve their skills and try to better serve their readership. I have a childish belief: that in the long-run, quality will always win, whether in newspaper, book, theater, film, architecture etc. And even if a paper folds, the quality remains in the archives for the readers (or researchers) of the future. Try to stick to this, until the wind turns.