ABC'S for Feb What do they mean?

The ABC'S for the nationals are out and once again commentators are opinionating on what it all means.

What it certainly means is that once again circulations amongst the nationals is falling.The biigest falls appear to be amongst the mid market papers in Feb with the Mail recent stron run ending and the Express showing year on year falls of around 8%.

Roy Greenslade writes that for the Mail in particular,

"having enjoyed such a lengthy upward trajectory, it is an embarrassing reversal of fortunes. Its problems aren't of the order of many other titles, of course, but it does signify a softening of its sale that is unprecedented in its recent history"

The Guardian and the Times are both shedding readers as well,a point not lost on comment son the Guardian media blog

"Both you in particular and Media Guardian in general are doing a great job of avoiding talking about the Guardian's ABC numbers (biggest drop among ``quality'' national newspapers in Feb, and dreadful numbers for Observer, too). Gagged? Or is it a case that problems away from home are easier to see than those close by?"


Sunday paper's in particular seem to be under attack both in the quality section and the popular catagory,the Times and the Observer seem to be under particular pressure here.

Peter Cole ,writing in the IOS,takes a differing approach to measuring readership reminding us that

"We have now entered the age of multi-platform publishing, and in the newspaper business this means publishing all the content you have assembled in a variety of ways - on your website, on mobile phones, and as podcasts, downloads and video."

Whilst the sales figures are declining the appetite for news is growing

"The matter is further confused by what you measure and how you measure it. Online is global; most advertisers are national, regional or local. And how are we measuring the numbers logging on to a particular newspaper website - in terms of unique users, or of the audience size or reach? Similarly, what do we mean when we talk about the frequency with which one person goes to one site - number of different places (pages) visited, or frequency of use?"

Should we therefore be that concerned about this measure of readership which was after all brought in when covergence was just a future thought?

Interestingly the current state of the media report suggests that technology is overwelming the old ways of measuring the audience for news and content producers feel that"the old yardsticks are undercounting their readers