Repurposing content is not a terribly new concept. Webmasters that picked up on the trend have benefited from traffic surges for a while now. Repurposing content is all about presenting the same content in a variety of different ways, or using different mediums to present the same content. Webmasters can manipulate content in order to provide the same content in any number of different formats.
Why would publishers want to do this? There are a number of benefits to repurposing content, not the least of which is that it allows customers to select the format they wish to access your information. Additionally, repurposing content often does not require a lot of extra time, expense, or additional effort. The content itself already exists — the format is just different. Additionally, there are a number of software tools available that can assist users in easily repurposing the content.