The Change Mariner

Broadsheet vs. Tabloid: Profound shift in British reading habits and social divisions

StraitsTimes:
A new chapter in the history of journalism unfolds today as The Times, arguably Britain's most venerable daily newspaper, appears in both its traditional large-paper format and a smaller, so-called tabloid version.

The change is of major importance in that it might well be symptomatic of a profound shift in British reading habits and social divisions.

It might also indicate a trend which could spread throughout the English-speaking world.

... Full-format newspapers, the so-called broadsheets, have been perceived as quality publications for the more educated and affluent while tabloids are for the masses - and newspaper editors know their audiences well.

So a war could erupt in some corner of Europe and The Sun tabloid might ignore it completely, devoting its front page instead to a story about a film star's divorce.

A mere glance at the newspaper being read was often all that was needed in order to evaluate an individual.

If it was The Sun, the reader was probably a single, male manual labourer. If it was The Guardian, the reader was probably a Labour Party voter of higher education and usually a civil servant.

The Daily Telegraph was for Conservative voters, The Financial Times reserved for people in the banking and insurance sectors, and The Times the newspaper of record in which members of the ruling class read about one another and announced their births, marriages and deaths.

...Everything changed, however, when The Independent, the smallest of the quality dailies, launched a tabloid version recently.

To the amazement of media experts, its circulation jumped by more than 7 per cent last month, a huge amount in a crowded and generally declining newspaper marketplace. The temptation for The Times to follow suit became inevitable.

But the fundamental question to which nobody seems to have an answer is why, after centuries, does the basic distinction between the tabloid and the broadsheet appear to be crumbling so rapidly?

The explanation may lie partly in a changing Britain, and it may be partly related to more global shifts in readership habits.

...Newspapers no longer provide the most immediate news source and cannot compete with the electronic media in speed of delivery.

People read newspapers either in order to obtain wider background commentaries on stories which they already know, or as pure entertainment.

The result is that education levels, social origins or income are no longer the determinants in newspaper consumption.

Indeed, the entire make-up of the readership of the press is being reshuffled.

Furthermore, the availability of many press articles on the Internet has further affected the question of a newspaper's format.

Posted by Norm M. Wada at November 26, 2003 11:38 AM | TrackBack
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