Google's taking over the newspapers now!

From Search Engine Watch Blog...
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Google Print Ads Now in AdWords Console

Andy Beal at Marketing Pilgrim has posted screenshots of the new Google Print Ads interface in the AdWords console. Google announced last month that the program would enter an extended beta this month.

The new tab offers advertisers the ability to buy print ads in participating newspapers, including the New York Times, Chicago Tribune, and LA Times. The console includes a date range for the campaign, weekly budget, and the ability to select newspapers by schedule, circulation, or relative cost.

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So what's next?
I think that Google ought to just buy a bunch of little newspapers. That's right - little, suburban newspaper firms that aren't relatively expensive to buy up. For 3 billion dollars, they could probably buy up an entire metro area... or the eastern seaboard. I haven't done any concrete research on the value of small newspaper firms. But anyway, here's the scenario:

1. Buy 100 newspapers in the same state, MSA, or CMSA.
2. Consolidate the advertising divisions of all 100 of them.
3. Consolidate printing of the newspapers.
4. Sell the ads online mostly, through an auction-based, adwords-style system.
5. Now that they are all printed at the same place, and Google owns the whole operation, the newspaper ads can be printed alongside articles with high keyword relevance. Ads can be run throughout all the newpapers, instead of clients having to decide which individual newspaper they want to run an ad in. Since these papers cover an entire region, the ads will be run in the most efficient way, across the entire region.
6. Watch public opinions change, as people are slowly brainwashed by inundation with ads.
7. Keys to the city are given to Google.

I thought it was kind of interesting, for a theory. Anyway...