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WASHINGTON: Newspaper circulation in the United States has dropped by 2.6 per cent in the six-month period ending March as people are turning to the Internet and other sources for news and information.
    
The decline in average paid weekday circulation was about the same as the previous six-month reporting cycle for the period ending last September but the average paid circulation at Sunday newspapers fell 3.1 per cent as opposed to the same period last year, the Newspaper Association of America said.

 

The figures have been based on the association's analysis of circulation posted by the Audit Bureau of Circulations, which reports figures of individual newspapers.

 

The NAA reported that in spite of a drop in newspaper circulation, newspaper-run web sites had an eight per cent increase in viewers in the first quarter -- newspaper web sites averaged 56 million users in the period, or 37 per cent of all online users in the period.

 

According to figures supplied by the Audit Bureau, USA Today continues to remain the top-selling newspaper with nearly 2.3 million copies or up by 0.09 per cent from the same period a year ago. The Wall Street Journal is ranked second, selling over 2 million copies but down one per cent.

 

What is quite revealing in the figures is that there is a significant decline for newspapers considered top in this country -- Los Angeles Times is down 5.4 per cent; The Washington Post down by 3.7 per cent and the New York Daily News down by 3.7 per cent.

 

But a few well known publications have registered small increases such as The New York Times by 0.5 per cent and the Chicago Tribune by nearly 1 per cent.