Tabloid

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This article is about the newspaper format. For information about tabloids in the visual media see Tabloid television.

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Newspaper sizes in August 2005. Le Monde is in the Berliner format. The Guardian was (until September 2005) in the British broadsheet format, whereas the Daily Mail is a tabloid, and The Times a "compact". Berliner Zeitung and Neues Deutschland are of sizes between broadsheet and Berliner. A piece of white A4 paper is placed in front for scale.

A tabloid is a newspaper industry term which refers to a smaller newspaper format per spread; to a weekly or semi-weekly alternative newspaper that focuses on local-interest stories and entertainment, often distributed for free (often in a smaller, tabloid-sized newspaper format); or to a newspaper that tends to emphasise sensational crime stories, gossip columns repeating scandalous innuendos about the personal lives of celebrities and sports stars, and other so-called "junk food news" (often in a smaller, tabloid-sized newspaper format).

1 Smaller-size newspaper
2 As a weekly alternative newspaper
3 As a sensational, gossip-filled newspaper
4 See also
5 External links

[edit] Smaller-size newspaper

A tabloid is a newspaper format particularly popular in the United Kingdom. A tabloid format newspaper is roughly 23½ by 14¾ inches (597 mm × 375 mm) per spread. This is the smaller of two standard newspaper sizes; the larger newspapers, traditionally associated with 'higher-quality' journalism, are called broadsheets (although some British 'quality' papers have recently adopted the tabloid format; 'The Guardian' being the exception by adopting the Berliner Format). A third major format for newspapers is the Berliner, which is sized between the tabloid and the broadsheet.

[edit] History

The name may be derived from Burroughs-Wellcome's 1884 trademark for their process of making "tablet-like" compressed pharmaceuticals. The connotation of compressed tablet was soon applied to other small items and to the "compressed' journalism that condensed stories into a simplified, easily-absorbed format. The label of "tabloid journalism" (1901) preceded the smaller sheet newspapers that contained it (1918).

An early pioneer of tabloid journalism was Alfred Harmsworth (1865-1922), who amassed a large publishing empire of helfpenny papers by rescuing failing stolid papers and transforming them to reflect the popular taste, which yielded him enormous profits. Harmsworth used his tabloids to influence public opinion, for example, by bringing down the wartime government of Prime Minister Herbert Henry Asquith in the Shell Crisis of 1915.

[edit] US tabloid-sized newspapers

This style of journalism and newspaper publishing has been exported to various other countries, including the United States. The daily tabloids in the United States -- which date back to the founding of the New York Daily News in 1919 -- are generally much less overheated and less oriented towards scandal and sensationalism than their British counterparts. However, since its initial purchase by Rupert Murdoch in 1976, the New York Post has become the exemplar of the brash British-style tabloid in the US, and its competition with the Daily News has become newspaper legend.

Other prominent US tabloids are the Philadelphia Daily News, the Chicago Sun-Times, the Rocky Mountain News in Denver, the Boston Herald, Newsday on New York's Long Island and The Examiner, which is a free newspaper published in San Francisco, Washington, D.C. and Baltimore. (Newsday co-founder Alicia Patterson was the daughter of Joseph Patterson, founder of the New York Daily News.)

[edit] European tabloid-sized newspapers

The biggest tabloid (and newspaper in general) in Europe, by circulation, is Germany's Bild-Zeitung, with around 4 million copies (down from above 5 million in the 1980s). Although its paper size is bigger, its style was copied from the British tabloids.

In the UK, three previously broadsheet daily newspapers—The Independent, The Times, and The Scotsman—have recently switched to tabloid size, although they call it "compact" to avoid the down-market connotation of that word. Similarly, when referring to the down-market tabloid newspapers the alternative term "red-top" (referring to their traditionally red-coloured mastheads) is increasingly used, to distinguish them from the up-market compact newspapers.

In the Netherlands, several newspapers have started publishing tabloid versions of their newspapers, including the major 'quality' newspaper, NRC Handelsblad, with NRC•Next in 2006. Two free tabloid newspapers were also introduced in the early 2000s, 'Metro' and 'Spits', mostly for distribution in public transportation. In 2007 a third, higher quality 'train tabloid' appeared, 'De Pers'.

[edit] Tabloid-sized newspapers in other countries

In the People's Republic of China, Chinese tabloids have exploded in popularity since the mid-1990s and have tested the limits of press censorship by taking editorial positions critical of the government and by engaging in critical investigative reporting.

In Georgia, weekly The FINANCIAL switched to compact format in 2005 and doubled number of pages. English language newspaper is published on high quality paper and distributed free of charge among bankers, top decision-makers. Other newspapers publishing in Georgian language tested compact format early in 1990s.

In Russia and Ukraine maijor English language newspapers like Moscow Times, Kiev Post, use compact format.

[edit] As a weekly alternative newspaper

The more recent usage of the term 'tabloid' refers to weekly or semi-weekly newspapers in tabloid format. Many of these are essentially straightforward newspapers, publishing in tabloid format, because subway and bus commuters prefer to read smaller-size newspapers. These newspapers are distinguished from the major daily newspapers, in that they purport to offer an "alternative" viewpoint, either in the sense that the paper's editors are more locally-oriented, or that the paper is editorially independent from major media conglomerates.

Other factors that distinguish "alternative" weekly tabloids from the major daily newspapers are their less-frequent publication, and that they are usually free to the user, since they rely on ad revenue. As well, alternative weekly tabloids tend to concentrate on local- or even neighbourhood-level issues, and on local entertainment in the bars and local theatres.

Alternative tabloids can be positioned as upmarket (quality) newspapers, to appeal to the better-educated, higher-income sector of the market; as middle-market (popular); or as downmarket (sensational) newspapers, which emphasize sensational crime stories and celebrity gossip. In each case, the newspapers will draw their advertising revenue from different types of businesses or services. An upmarket weekly's advertisers are often organic-grocers, boutiques, and theatre-companies while a downmarket's may have those of trade-schools, super-markets, and adult-services, both usually contain ads from local bars, auto-dealers, movie theaters, and a classified-ads section.

[edit] As a sensational, gossip-filled newspaper

The term "tabloid" can also refers to a newspaper that tends to emphasise sensational crime stories, gossip columns about the personal lives of celebrities and sports stars, and junk food news. Often, tabloid newspaper allegations about the sexual practices, drug use, or private conduct of celebrities is borderline defamatory; in many cases, celebrities have successfully shown that tabloid stories have defamed them, and sued for libel.

Tabloid newspapers in Britain, collectively called the tabloid press, tend to be simply and sensationally written, and to give more prominence than broadsheets to celebrities, sports, crime stories and even hoaxes; they also more readily take a political position (either left- or right-wing) on news stories, ridiculing politicians, demanding resignations and predicting election results. The term red top (as in "News International red tops sweep the board") refers to tabloids with red nameplates, such as The Sun, the Daily Mirror and the Daily Star, and distinguishes them from the black top Daily Express and Daily Mail. Red top newspapers are usually simpler in writing style, dominated by pictures, and directed at the more sensational end of the market. Tabloid newspapers are sometimes pejoratively called the gutter press.

Since 1999, most of the major US supermarket tabloids (as distinct from local newspapers in the tabloid format) ; i.e., the Enquirer, Star, Globe, Examiner, ¡Mira!, Sun, and Weekly World News) have been under single ownership.