While U.S. newspapers are losing subscribers at a staggering rate, a few dailies stand out because their circulation is rising. But they aren’t necessarily selling more copies.
Here’s why: Since April 1, new auditing rules have made it easier for newspapers to count a reader as a paying customer.
These looser standards are especially helpful to a newspaper if it sells an “electronic edition.” That can include a subscriber-only Web site, such as what The Wall Street Journal has, or it can be a digital replica of a newspaper’s printed product. Several dozen publications, including USA Today, sell access to these daily “e-editions” that show how the news was laid out in print.
Under the new auditing standards, if a newspaper sells a “bundled” subscription to both the print and electronic editions, the publication is often allowed to count that subscriber twice.
Read More: By MICHAEL LIEDTKE, AP
Photo Credit: judsond (Creative Commons)
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