During last quarter's earning conference call, Yahoo president Sue Decker cited Yahoo's partnership with newspapers as an indicator that her company's "commitment to being the industry's partner of choice is gaining traction." But now, a year into the newspaper deal, and a week before Yahoo's third-quarter earnings announcement, Alan Mutter sees problems with the program. Early newspaper partners aren't sustaining the nearly 50 percent gains in online revenues they saw initially. The newspapers and their investors were counting on sustained online growth to displace growing losses in print advertising. Yahoo, with more than 400 newspapers involved in its online advertising pact, may be committed to creating partnerships. And talking, endlessly, about those partnerships. And promoting executives involved in striking those partnerships. But if Decker doesn't show the same commitment to producing substantial results for Yahoo's partners, they won't be partners for long.

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