Nieman Foundation at Harvard
Poynter’s Rick Edmonds notes the coming of a long-ago announced physical shrinkage of the Columbus Dispatch (and, soon, the Cincinnati Enquirer). The new format will be the size of two landscape iPads placed next to one another. Saves money on newsprint, makes the paper easier to carry around. Rick:
This allows a newspaper to add content and increase the ratio of news to ads and still produce the print edition less expensively. In the Dispatch’s case, [Dispatch editor Ben] Marrison wrote, the paper will restore a freestanding business section and add a second A section with national and international news.
You may recall that the reason respectable newspapers grew so big and unwieldy was a 1712 British tax on newspapers that was levied by the page. Bigger pages = fewer pages. Quality dailies in the U.K. made the switch years ago.
