A new daily newspaper is going to begin publication in your city. It will be free, offered to transit riders, and basically, it’s designed to be a more-tightly written version of USA Today, offering a very basic summary of the day’s top headlines. Other area newspapers, however, take to the courts, seeking an injunction against the paper before the presses can be webbed with rolls of newsprint for the premiere edition of the paper.
The new newspaper, being led by a Swiss company, Modern Times Group, which handles papers in European countries, as well as one in Santiago, Chile. The Metro, being headed up in Philadelphia by long-time newspaperman Jack Roberts, former editor at the Philadelphia Daily News, as well as being the former editor who helped launch Crain’s Chicago Business, is the company’s first attempt in a U.S. market, but other cities are presently being eyed, as well.
So what’s the big deal over a new newspaper, albeit free? Well, seems the media moguls don’t like competition if they can’t tread the same water.
The New York Times Co., Gannett Satellite Information Network, Inc., whose holdings include USA Today, The Reporter of Lansdale (PA.), and South Jersey’s Courier Post, and Philadelphia Newspapers, Inc., publisher of the Philadelphia Daily News and the Philadelphia Inquirer, filed a request for an immediate restraining order against the Metro which would have prevented the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA), the local transportation authority, from distributing the free newspaper in any area that is off-limits to distribution of other publications.
The concern: The chief goal of SEPTA, which contracted Modern Times Group to publish the paper, is to get the newspaper into the hands of transit riders first thing each morning. The only catch: SEPTA is to receive one full page of advertising in each day’s paper to deliver whatever message they want. That full-page ad is free, but is also near the center of the controversy.
U.S. District Judge Robert F. Kelly issued a two-sentence order the day the Metro was introduced, Monday, Jan. 17, 2000. Failing to file an opinion explaining his ruling, the order said the contesting media companies failed to show that the Metro’s distribution plans would cause them “immediate and irreparable harm.”
“We’re obviously pleased the federal court has found we have a legitimate contract with Metro,” SEPTA spokesman Richard Maloney said, adding that the ruling vindicated the service the transportation company wants to provide.
Kelly’s findings that there was a lack of “immediate and irreparable harm” to the newspaper companies being represented seems to be based on an emergency statement issued by one SEPTA official that equipment needed to distribute the 24-page tabloid on buses might not be ready for another two weeks.
Officials for SEPTA also said they would not, at least for now, distribute the Metro on subway and rail platforms or other areas where commuters paid to gain entry.
The lawsuit, filed on Friday, Jan. 14, contends that distribution in those areas would violate the First Amendment because SEPTA would become a governmental entity publishing its own newspaper and would have a competitive edge over regular newspapers and publications.
Metro reported a pressrun of 165,000 on its first day, finding eager readers among SEPTA commuters.
Most stories in the paper are no longer than one or two paragraphs in length. Full-color is used throughout the tabloid, which is edited by Mary Ellen
Bornak, who said people who have turned from reading the daily newspaper they lack time. The Metro, Bornak wrote in a column, is for those people “who have abandoned traditional newspapers because they have no time to read.”
Roberts said he expects the newspaper will begin running classified ads in the future, once the paper is more established. He also said he expects to sell half the paper’s 24 pages for advertising.
Is there a problem in Philadelphia, which not so long ago, in the early 1980s, in fact, was a four, repeat, F-O-U-R daily newspaper town, with competition? It looks that way. Philadelphia Newspapers, Inc., is losing revenue from its banner newspaper, the Philadelphia Inquirer as that paper’s circulation continues a downward spiral. But the Daily News, which back in the 70s boasted being a “commuter paper,” wants a cut of the pie. But the two old bullies want the corner they have, but also the new corner being built. They don’t want
competition.
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"Newspapers
Make the News Over New Newspaper"
