The Guardian has made a decision that it says will affect the entire newspaper industry - publishing on the web first and in print second.

But for a newspaper to say that the website comes first is a big, big step. Ever since the second coming of the internet - the first coming ended around 2001, to the delight of all those newspaper executives who didn't like the look of it - there has been a given in newspaper offices: we will take the internet seriously, but we must not let it get in the way of our primary business, which is publishing a paper each night.

What that means in practice is yet to be worked out and some exclusives will be print exclusives still. Anyway, it's a brave move and a necessary one, but it won't necessarily mean the news either online or off is always fresh. Sometimes newspapers recycle stuff, especially internet related stuff, simply because they don't realise it's old. That's an issue of awareness, not of publishing deadlines or medium.