Newsroom employment dropped by 11.3 percent in 2008, with the industry losing some 5,900 jobs, according to the American Society of News Editors.

It’s the biggest drop the organization has recorded since it first started conducting its employment surveys in 1978. The number of newsroom jobs is now at a level last seen in the early 1980s, it said.

However, other findings from the survey reveal that there was a significant 21 percent rise in the number of online-only journalists last year to 2,300.