Who wants to be a millionaire? The answer is that we all do. But the latest twist to the old song is that the internet now allows us to nurture our dreams without having to endure the torment of Chris Tarrant.

Media analysts have been saying for some time that the value of online information is as much the information itself as the fact that the internet allows us to read it and play with it from anywhere in the world, at any time.

"Content"- what is put on the web - was a buzzword long before America Online, the world's largest internet service provider, confirmed its value with last month's bid for Time Warner, the apotheosis of an old media group.

The buzz has highlighted greater opportunities for journalists themselves. Accustomed to working in a business that sometimes prides itself on working for nothing, journalists are suddenly finding the laws of supply and demand working in their favour. News organisations have seen their West Coast bureaux used as springboards for dot com careers, while reporters have taken to using their leaving speeches to deny rumours that they have already been given a stake worth millions in their new online start-up.

Caught in the headlights of the online competition beaming on to their businesses, media groups appear to have woken up to the staffing implications in recent months. But how does an old media group compete with the lure of internet millions and continue to recruit and retain top-notch staff?

One solution is a join-them-if-you-can't-beat-them strategy. The New York Times became one of the first traditional media companies to take a definite step into this arena two weeks ago when it announced plans to issue shares that reflect the performance of its separate internet division rather than that of the entire company. Viacom is to make a similar move by offering shares in the web operations of MTV.

The attraction of issuing shares designed to track the performance of an online business is that the shares are no longer hindered by their connection to a slow-growing old media group. This attraction can be powerful. America's six largest publicly traded newspaper groups, which together own 140 newspapers and 54 television stations, were valued by the US stock market at about two-thirds of Yahoo, the internet portal.

The NYT is hoping to raise about $100m (£63m) by spinning off the nytimes.com and its other loss-making internet operations. The listing is not just designed to furnish the company with more money. In announcing its decision, the company declared that some of the shares will be available for staff members.

Few details of the offering are available because of US financial regulations and several questions remain about how these shares are going to be allocated.

The first is, does the company offer most shares to the dot com-savvy staff members they most fear losing to online rivals? The answer for most industry executives is often yes. The problem is that online websites such as nytimes.com are largely fuelled by the editorial staff of the paper edition. Why should these dull.co drones not be equally rewarded for their contribution?

Also, if a media group's internet operations are spun off, what happens to the value of existing assets? What investors will want to buy shares in a company faced with falling circulation, escaping classified advertising and disaffected staff?

Pearson, owner of the FT, has recently decided against a similar tracking stock for its online operations. Instead, the group raised money for its internet ambitions simply by issuing more shares of its own. This did little to answer the personnel problems, however, and the group - which has seen three FT technology reporters leave for dot coms in recent months - is set to announce a new staffing incentive scheme over the coming weeks. This is expected to spread Pearson share options throughout the newsroom.

Such options are unlikely to lead to the sorts of riches now part of internet lore. However, groups such as Pearson hope that the added bonus will retain loyalty to a less risky media business.

It remains to be seen how such schemes work. But they do represent one way of giving incentives to staff that are not open to the few remaining media companies with no route to the stock market. Notable examples include the BBC and the trust-owned Guardian.

Other industries have adopted different strategies to keep valued members of staff. Leading law firms in the US are understood to have increased pay by as much as 50% since the beginning of the year for some associates. Any journalist hoping that traditional media companies might follow suit would be wise not to leave that as their final answer. As Chris Tarrant might say.