Portugal's New Paper Points to Print's Future
New launch shows rethinking the newspaper can raise circulation
Gavin O'Reilly, Independent son and chief executive, is also a big cheese at the World Association of Newspapers, currently planning its much-delayed annual conference in Hyderabad. Gavin, meet Martim Avillez Figueiredo from Lisbon, the hottest ticket on your speaker list.
Figueiredo has just started one of the world's most innovative (and immediately successful) papers. It's called i, and comes in four distinct and radically unusual sections.
First, opinion and comment; then Radar, the news in small, pre-digested chunks. Zoom, the heart of the paper at section three, is all long articles on significant topics; and More, at four, mops up everything else.
"The idea is not to build a new daily paper, but to try to build a new media brand," says its founder, outlining new ways in distribution and staff recruitment to match.
Pause for pondering far beyond Portugal. So little creative effort has gone into rethinking poor old print. But i is a newspaper radically reshaped from scratch, finding out what readers want – and giving it them in the order they want it. Circulation: up 16% in the last two months. Possibilities: clear, and startlingly at odds with dreary, accepted wisdom.
Figueiredo has just started one of the world's most innovative (and immediately successful) papers. It's called i, and comes in four distinct and radically unusual sections.
First, opinion and comment; then Radar, the news in small, pre-digested chunks. Zoom, the heart of the paper at section three, is all long articles on significant topics; and More, at four, mops up everything else.
"The idea is not to build a new daily paper, but to try to build a new media brand," says its founder, outlining new ways in distribution and staff recruitment to match.
Pause for pondering far beyond Portugal. So little creative effort has gone into rethinking poor old print. But i is a newspaper radically reshaped from scratch, finding out what readers want – and giving it them in the order they want it. Circulation: up 16% in the last two months. Possibilities: clear, and startlingly at odds with dreary, accepted wisdom.
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