Newspapers, beset by the long-term disintegration of their traditional business model and by the pressures of the recession, are being closed across the world. What, if anything, replaces them? Coffee, it turns out, could be part of the answer.

Bloggers, often jubilant at the decline of journalism they regarded as pompous, slow and tame, have often suggested that they are the future of journalism, connected peer-to-peer, immediate and not hidebound by rules and closeness to power. But with less fanfare, we are also seeing a series of experiments which mix the skills of professional journalists with those of their readers and which use “citizen-generated” content. Digital technology opens journalism to more people.

An interesting experiment in hybrid publishing combining new and old has started in the Czech Republic. A chain of coffee shops has been set up in several Czech towns, which are also local newsrooms: customers can surf the web, find help with social networking sites, chat about local events and exchange information with reporters who work in the café.

These newsrooms-with-caffeine produce digital news for communities of 10,000 households and weekly newspapers for slightly larger readerships. It is a bold experiment, known in the jargon as “hyperlocal” publishing.

The publishers are not only hiring reporters and advertisement sales people for each coffee shop but catering managers as well. Location is everything. Petr Vitasek, the editor in the eastern Czech town of Olomouc, said: “Well-located newspoints will be critical in getting journalists to work closer to their readers.”

Many of the 90 staff hired so far are under 30, but PPF Group, the financial multinational investing in this experiment, realised that the coffee shop teams would not be strong enough to survive competition from established local newspapers. So they have set up a training base in Prague — “Futuroom”, where the most experienced editors are based.

The shortage of GPs is a big political issue for Czechs, so the team in Prague pulls in stories on the issue from communities across the country and blends them together, perhaps adding a national or international angle to strengthen the mix. The final version is then fed back to local websites. Local reporters are helped by seasoned editors in the capital to develop the stories further.

The Futuroom acts as a newsdesk and a training space; partners supplying expertise include the World Editors Forum and Google - which provides trainers to help journalists use Google maps, ad software and search tools. Why has Google, usually so shy of becoming involved in journalism's content, stepped in? It may not be a coincidence that the Czech Republic is one of the few countries where Google is not the dominant search engine.

Not everything about the Nase Adresa (literally “Our Address”) chain is radically new. There will be discounts for early advertisers and readers. The business model relies on the strength of the local journalism attracting advertisment income.

However, no amount of sophisticated models can reliably predict if the business can survive and grow, until it is tried. Can these little sites and newspapers grow large enough to hold their own against local authorities and businesses? To get a network off the ground, Roman Gallo, director of media strategy at PPF, admits that they are “low-cost oriented”.

So few experiments have yet been tried in raising advertising from such small target groups that there is little to go on. It is possible to admire the design of the network, applaud the aims and especially the intimacy of the newsroom cafes, but yet harbour doubts about whether they can thrive.

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