Introduction

In Britain, national newspapers contribute substantially to the supposedly shared sense of what it means to be 'British' in a global environment. This is particularly the case in Britain since unlike in other contexts such as the USA almost all the major British newspapers operate and are distributed at the national level. Yet sales of British newspapers are in long-term decline. On this basis, it is commonly supposed that their influence is similarly on the wane. The diminution of the power of the newspaper in Britain and worldwide seems all the more plausible when we take account of the development of alternative news-delivery platforms. The past 100 years or so brought first radio and then television as speedier disseminators of news and information, which, many have subsequently argued, enabled consumption practices that fit readily with the communal activities of the household. More recent decades have seen the Internet emerge as a force in the production and distribution of news, emphasising a form of news delivery that thus far appears to have more in common with the imagery of television than the typography and organisation of the newspaper page, coupled with the more direct threat of daily 'free sheet' newspapers distributed to morning commuters.