Not a surprise, it just confirms much of the anecdotal evidence we have known for months. Major newspaper's circulation is now 44 million copies a day - fewer than any time since the 1940's. Ad revenue has collapsed down 28% in last 6mths to Sept 30, 2009. Circulation figures do not include online audience - except for 400,000 paid subscribers at the Wall Street Journal, mostly because very few newspapers are charging for online access. Unique online visits are up 20% to 72 million over 2007.However I would characterize it as - the large well supported urban decision makers grow stronger while the "wannabe" franchise media outlets get weaker. This is mirroring the traditional movement of individuals to better resourced urban area's (although with the Real Estate meltdown, that contention is taking a beating). One online blog echo's these concerns by noting that he fears that "newspapers are offering less".
Two market anomaly's are Denver and Seattle where Rocky Mountain News and Post-Intelligencer closed to the benefit of remaining competitors.
Fragmentation continues - but what is the answer?
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