• Associated Press, Friday, May 9, 2008 10:45 AM

The news is all bad for the Sun-Times Media Group. It said Thursday it had a dramatic first-quarter net loss of $35.8 million due to "continued steep declines in advertising revenue and circulation." A sale could come soon. CEO Cyrus Freidheim says the company has been informally contacted by potential buyers, and he expects formal negotiations to start in late May.

Despite heavy cost cuts, the parent of the Chicago Sun-Times and smaller area newspapers couldn't stop the mass defection of readers and advertisers to the Internet. "We expect the secular move from print to the Internet to continue probably forever," Freidheim says.

The company also had to pay $5.5 million in legal costs in the quarter for the ongoing appeals process for former CEO Conrad Black, who is serving a six-year prison sentence for swindling shareholders of the former Hollinger International.

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