This week Pew published its big State of the News Media 2013 report, with lots of insight into the fortunes of and prospects for mainstream media outlets, as well as some types of niche and alternative media.

The report has little to say directly about startup community news and engagement projects -- but reading between the lines, it hints at some growing opportunities in the community media landscape.

Here are four possible opportunities and advantages for community news/info projects that I gathered from reading the report's key findings:

1. The mobile web has become crucial to digital news. The Pew Research Center Project on Excellence in Journalism noted that nearly one third of U.S. adults now owns a tablet computer, and about half now own a smartphone.

Also, "In 2012, total traffic to the top 25 news sites increased 7.2%, according to comScore. And according to Pew Research data, 39% of respondents got news online or from a mobile device 'yesterday,' up from 34% in 2010, when the survey was last conducted."

And: "An August 2012 Pew Research study found that fully 64% of tablet owners say they get news on their devices weekly; 37% reported they do so daily. The trend is nearly identical for smartphone owners -- 62% said they consume news on their device weekly, and 36% do so daily."

Taken together, these statistics underscore that the mobile web is a good place for any news/information venue (including those aimed at communities) to focus its resources. This isn't just a matter of your mobile strategy, but your overall strategy.

Providing a mobile-friendly website allows you to serve the greatest diversity of devices (including laptop and desktop computers) -- without the expense, overhead and pigeonholing inherent in an app-focused mobile strategy. The most effective and efficient way to offer a mobile-friendly website is to adopt responsive web design.

Implementing responsive design is much easier for newer and smaller websites. Existing media outlets would have a much harder time making this switch than most community media projects.

2. In-person word of mouth is most effective for news transmission. Digital transmission, including through social media is growing. But as it turns out, news still travels mostly person to person.This could give an edge to venues and projects that focus on communities where people probably know, contact, and encounter each other regularly.

Pew noted: "Nearly three-quarters, 72%, say the most common way they hear about news events from family and friends is by talking in person or over the phone. But 15% get most news from family and friends through social media sites. And it rises to nearly a quarter among 18-to-25-year-olds. 7% do so via e-mail. Either way, the vast majority say they then seek out news stories to learn more."

One way to leverage person-to-person transmission might be to post content such as open questions intended to spark discussion, provide a variety of ways for people to contribute (beyond just story comments and social media -- think call-in lines, e-mails, photo sharing and more), and explicitly encourage people to discuss the issue with their friends, family, and neighbors. This could prove far more effective in engaging communities than traditional reporting, which often can spark discussion but does little to support or amplify/reflect it.

3. Mobile audio: growing opportunity. According to Pew, "Drive-time -- once the premier domain of terrestrial radio -- is becoming overtaken by mobile devices. The number of cellphone owners streaming content into their cars from their phones has nearly tripled in three years, according to Arbitron. Many of the streaming options do not even include the top-of-the-hour news headlines that air on most AM/FM stations."

This might indicate that podcasting -- once a fairly small slice of the overall audio audience -- might be becoming a more viable channel to reach communities. Podcasting is fairly low-cost and simple to try. For the basics, check out the free Learn How to Podcast 101 series of video tutorials.

A good way to experiment is to launch an audio podcast for a specific period of time, focused on a specific community issue or segment -- don't make an open-ended, nebulous commitment before you really know what you're doing. A series of short, lively interviews is perhaps the easiest and most engaging approach for your first podcast project. And don't forget to set up a call-in comment line using Google Voice to collect audio comments that you can insert into your series as audience feedback. (You can download Google Voice voicemails as MP3 audio files.)

Get the feed for your podcast listed in iTunes and all the other popular podcast directories. Publicize it heavily via social media, e-mail newsletters (your own, and those of partners and allies), fliers, you website, and more. Post a tutorial on your website for how people can subscribe to your content (via iTunes, or provide links to popular free streaming audio or "podcatcher" apps like Stitcher and BeyondPod).

4. Your community may be seeking more, better news. This year, a special Pew survey revealed: "The public is noticing an impact [of newsroom cuts] on the content --- and is beginning to abandon certain news outlets. Nearly a third (31%) of U.S. adults have deserted a news outlet because it no longer provides the news and information they had grown accustomed to receiving. And respondents seem to be noticing erosion in quality of coverage even more than diminishing quantity. Fully 61% said they noticed that stories were less complete compared with 24% who said they noticed fewer stories over all."

This may be an opportune time for new projects to make a splash by focusing on issues where strong, proven community interest exists -- but that are getting overlooked by diminishing mainstream news operations. Creative approaches to exploring education, transportation, crime, development and other quality-of-life community issues could easily shine. Again, the key is to choose focused projects that are easy to promote, on topics that community members are already discussing. Mobile microsites could help support such efforts, if your website isn't yet completely mobile friendly.