Newspapers Fall Further

Newly released figures on newspaper sales show a decline of nearly five percent from a year ago, accelerating a trend that has been occurring since the 1990s. Richard Perez-Pena notes that "Newspaper circulation has fallen about 2 percent annually for years but began to drop faster in the 2007 reports, and faster still in the reports issued last spring, which showed declines of 3.6 percent on weekdays and 4.6 percent on Sundays. ... Analysts have warned in recent years that by offering steadily less in print, newspapers were inviting readers to stop buying. Most papers have sharply reduced their physical size -- fewer and smaller pages, with fewer articles -- and the newsroom staffs that produce them." In an effort to cope with declining revenues, some newspapers are talking about cancelling their purchase of syndicated news from Associated Press, while the Christian Science Monitor has announced that it will cease publishing a daily print edition.