The gloomy industry outlook might suggest abject newspaper abandonment, but a report issued by Scarborough Research found 74 percent of adults in the U.S. are still reading news. Just maybe not in print form.
Though the Integrated Newspaper Audience survey, which ran from February 2008 through last March, asked respondents only if they read the newspaper in some form (online or offline), the results still provide more optimistic numbers than a report released by the Audit Bureau of Circulations last month, which found circulation had decreased 10 percent during the six-month period starting in April. But if circulation is rapidly decreasing (it declined 7 percent in the previous six-month period) despite these seemingly hopeful Scarborough figures, maybe the report is really just another indication that people would rather read their news for free.
