The Future of Reading

"Magazines, books, newspapers -- all that printed stuff is supposed to be dying. Advertising pages, which have been steadily declining, dropped 26% in 2009 alone. But here, surely, was some evidence that publishing might have a chance..."

Read more at Fortune Magazine.

Magazine-Sales Decline Slows at Newsstands

The Audit Bureau of Circulations says single-copy sales of magazines fell 9.1% at the 472 publications that report to the ABC. The newsweeklies and business titles were hit particularly hard on the newsstand in the second half of 2009. Newsweek falling 41%, Time declining 35%.
Total subscriptions fell 2.2% to 328.4 million.

Read more at the Wall Street Journal.

What Type of Articles Do People Email Each Other?

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania studied the New York Times list of most-e-mailed articles and found people preferred sending articles with positive rather than negative themes. They also liked to send long articles on intellectually challenging topics. Perhaps most of all, readers wanted to share articles that inspired awe, an emotion that the researchers investigated after noticing how many science articles made the list.

Read more at the New York Times.

Newsstand Sales and Circulation Fall for Magazines

Newsstand sales and subscriptions for magazines fell during the last six months of 2009, according to the ABC. Large single-copy declines included W (down 41.7%), Newsweek (down 41.3%), SmartMoney (down 37%), Good Housekeeping (down 30.7%) and Redbook (down 30.1%).

Large circulation declines were seen at TV Guide magazine, (down more than a quarter, to 2.4 million) and Prevention (down 13.2%, to 2.9 million).

Newsstand sales are often a more timely indicator of a magazine’s vitality than subscriptions which tend to lag and can be driven by discounts, according to the New York Times.

Read more at the New York Times.