Global circulation falls as readers become ‘promiscuous’

Worldwide daily newspaper circulation fell by nine million in 2010, according to the World Press Trends report launched last Thursday at the World Editors' Forum in Vienna. Last year the report recorded its first ever decrease in global newspaper circulation, which declined by 0.8 per cent in 2009. The latest study focused on the 69 countries which account for 90 per cent of global industry value, and found that circulation declined by overall by 2 per cent, dropping to 519 million in 2010. However the report added that "what has been lost to print has been more than made up by digital newspaper readers".
While internet consumption is increasing worldwide, newspapers continue to reach a larger daily audience of around 2.3 billion people, 20 per cent higher than the 1.9 billion reached by the internet. But the report suggests this is costing broadcast media more than newspapers, with the minutes spent listening to radio each day having dropped by 23 per cent since 2006, compared to just 7 per cent of the time spent consuming newspapers.
On a global scale the findings varied. The biggest decreases in newspaper circulations were reported in North America, with an 11 per cent year-on-year drop, while Europe also saw negative growth - in Western Europe circulations dropped by 2.5 per cent and in Eastern and Central Europe the losses were even higher at 12 per cent. However in the Asia Pacific region, circulation actually increased 7 per cent in 2010, and by 2 per cent in Latin America.