Friday 26 October 2007

Study dispels myths about UK newspaper reading habits

The Sunday Times is the newspaper British readers spend the most time with, according to a National Readership Survey out Friday.

This is the first time the NRS revealed a set of data regarding the time spent reading papers, and will become a standard NRS data release, MediaGuardian reported Friday.

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Ad group to EU: 'Closely examine' Google's DoubleClick deal

The World Federation of Advertisers has asked the European Union to “closely examine” Google's proposed $3.1 billion (£1.5 billion) purchase of DoubleClick, which the group says has the potential to greatly reduce competition in Internet advertising, MediaGuardian reported Friday.

The WFA sent a letter to the European Union's commission asking the EU to analyse the proposed acquisition as well as Microsoft's $6 billion (£2.92 billion) buyout of aQuantive and WPP's takeover of RealMedia.

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Sydney journalists outraged by front page advertisement

Journalists at the Sydney Morning Herald have protested the newspaper's use of its front page to promote Singapore Airlines Friday.

The broadsheet also devoted a four-page wraparound to Thursday's arrival of the airline's giant A380 airbus. The wraparound included a full-page Singapore Airlines advertisement and three smaller ads for the airline, as well as articles about the arrival of the world's largest passenger plane and other milestones in aviation, The Australian reported Friday.

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AP overhauls packaging and pricing structure

The board of The Associated Press on Thursday approved a major change on how it prices and packages news to U.S. newspapers.

Instead of offering news feeds defined by the volume of news delivered, the new plan will focus on a core service of all breaking news including national, state and international, with options for adding other services or purchasing stories individually.

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Britain drops proposed FOI legislation

The British government has dropped its proposals to tighten freedom of information legislation that would make rules more restrictive on cost limits for FOI requests and limit media access to coroners' courts and will instead investigate the idea for a freedom of expression audit for future legislation, the UK's Newspaper Society reported Thursday.

“We agree with Select Committee on Culture that a free press is a hallmark of our democracy, that there is no case for statutory regulation of the press, that self- regulation of the press should be maintained and that it is for publishers themselves to demonstrate by their decisions that they can sustain and bolster public confidence in the way information is gathered and used,” Prime Minister Gordon Brown said, according to the NS.

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Swiss free newspaper to be launched Dec. 5

Swiss media group Tamedia AG will launch its free newspaper on Dec. 5. The new publication, named “News”, will have 334,000 copies published for the first edition, the group said in a statement.

The paper is a joint venture between Swiss local papers Basler Zeitung, Berner Zeitung and the national daily Tages-Anzeiger.

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Sun Web site adopts to Escenic platform

The Sun's Web site is the latest to switch to Escenic CMS's content management platform.

More than 350 media sites in 14 countries have switched to Escenic Content Engine, including The Times Online and Die Welt, according to an Escenic statement.

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