Classifieds were a big portion of income. Craigslist effectively killed that in the mid 90s. It's been a slow steady decline to stay solvent. They had to switch to the "print what your audience wants to read," type of infotainment. Emotion, particularly fear is very effective to keep asses in seats (and eyes on screens).

I occasionally like to go back 10 years or so and read some of the ridiculous fear mongering of the time, now that it's well out of context.

https://www.minnpost.com/business/2014/02/how-craigslist-kil...