The Audit Bureau of Circulation has announced it will begin offering combined print and Web readership data of U.S. Newspapers.

Web and print numbers combined will be much more positive than print alone; however, an emerging question is whether advertisers will buy into it. Usually advertisers are guided by circulation when they buy print, and they pay much more for print readers than for Web readers. So, although the total readership is up, will advertisers look at the figure, or just concentrate on merely print and online numbers, like they always have?

The result of combining Web and print readership for the current six-month period will be released Nov. 5.