The Guardian - Audience Flashcards
What is the cover price of the Guardian? What does this price suggest?
£2.50. Its slightly higher price suggests it’s aimed at a more middle-upper educated class and it’s going to have high quality, informative content - idea that you’re paying for luxury
Where on the political spectrum is the Guardian?
mainstream left- liberal paper
What is the Guardian’s ethos?
undertake investigative journalism that gives a voice to the powerless and to hold power to account while being free from political and commercial influence
How popular is the Guardian in the UK?
5th most popular in the UK
what is the monthly print reach?
3 million
How many unique users does the Guardian reach online each month?
86 million
What is the average age of the Guardian?
44
How many 18-24 year olds have accessed the paper in the last 12 months
1 in 3
What is the gender balance of the paper?
slightlymore male orientated: 52% to 48%
What is the social demographic of the average Guardian user?
ABC1 make up 85%
To what extent are the majority of consumers educated?
54% are educated to degree level or above
What % of the UK’s public time on media sites was spent on the Guardian in the run open to elections
7%
How many uniquely monthly viewers don’t pay for the Guardian?
150 million unique monthly visitors that don’t pay
What milestone of digital subscribers did the Guardian hit in November 21?
At the end of November 2021, the Guardian reported a total of 1,000,035 digital subscriptions from supporters in 180 countries around the world.
In November 21, how many single payments were reported from the last year?
Where were many of these readers from?
In the 12 months to the end of November 2021, the Guardian also received 476,000 single contributions from readers across the world. Half of all single contributions in the past year came from the US.
What was the number with a print subscription in Nov 21?
The news publisher has 114,250 print subscriptions across the Guardian, the Observer and Guardian Weekly.
How can postmodernism be applied to the Guardian and Daily Mail (the lines between created texts and reality are becoming blurred)?
-More ‘lifestyle’ content online (celebrity/ popular culture obsession)
-Click bate/ sensational content on-line to make viewers stay on their website as long as possible
-Comment based content- introduction of fake news
-UK press deemed untrustworthy
What are the main psychographics of the Guardian’s readers?
The most obvious label would be reformers - ‘someone at the leading edge of society’ who looks for enlightenment. They have also been labelled as activators because they are at the forefront of innovation and the most open to new ideas. Also, some could be labelled as achievers, who focus on professional endeavour
What is the mode of address of the Guardian?
More personable: this is shown by the use of lowercase and curved font in the masthead. This suggests sophistication, linking to brand identity of strong investigative journalism. Similarly, the name The Guardian conveys the idea that they want to nurture there audience like a parental figure, suggesting the are trustworthy
This is in contrast to tabloid papers who are more sensationalist and emotion
-Linguistic content of the front page tend to be relatively neutral
What is the content of the Guardian like?
Choice of stories is serious and complex, suitable for a well educated audience
What is their stance to political parties?
They act as a ‘critical friend’ towards political parties
Why was the Guardian created in 1821?
to promote the liberal interest in the aftermath of the Peterloo massacre
How do the Guardian alter the message to persuade readers to donate money?
according to the content of the article and the behaviour of the digital reader
What was it like to live in Manchester England in 1819?
was mired in economic depression and high unemployment, while the Corn Laws, which kept the price of grain artificially high, brought mass hunger.
Also increasing demands for people to have the vote
Who was John Edward Taylor?
John Edward Taylor was in the crowd that day, reporting for a weekly paper, the Manchester Gazette. When a reporter for the daily Times of London was arrested, Taylor was concerned that the people of the capital might not get an accurate report of the massacre – he correctly feared that without the account of a journalist on the scene, Londoners would instead get only the official version of events, which would protect the magistrates who had caused the bloodshed.
So Taylor rushed a report on to the night coach to London, got it into the Times, and thus turned a Manchester demonstration into a national scandal. Taylor exposed the facts, without hysteria. By reporting what he had witnessed, he told the stories of the powerless, and held the powerful to account.
How many people died in the Peterloo Massacre?
18
When was the first edition of the Guardian?
5th May 1821
What was the mode of address when the paper started?
the Manchester Guardian could engage with the people who were starting to become involved in politics, giving them the information they need to take action. It is a wholly uncynical and unsnobbish document. It is on people’s side.
What controversies did the paper face after John Edward Taylor died?
It was highly profitable, but in becoming so it got too close to the Manchester cotton merchants who paid for the advertising that supported the paper. It even sided with the slave-owning south in the American civil war: the paper demanded that the Manchester cotton workers who starved in the streets because they refused to touch cotton picked by American slaves should be forced back into work.
What two challenges did Scott face when he became editor?
The first was the question of Irish Home Rule: Scott campaigned for self-government in Ireland – marking the moment when the Guardian most clearly became “a paper of the Left”.
At the end of the 19th century, Scott took the Guardian to an even more controversial anti-colonial position. During the second Boer war, from 1899 to 1902, Britain was rampantly jingoistic; anyone who opposed the war was cast as a traitor. The Guardian stood against it and ran a campaign for peace, while the brilliant Guardian reporter Emily Hobhouse exposed the concentration camps for the Boers run by the British.
How did the two challenges scott faced impact the sales of the paper?
The paper’s stance was so controversial that it lost advertisers and one-seventh of its sales. Scott’s courageous position nearly did kill the Guardian. But in standing up to the prevailing political mood of the day, Scott turned the newspaper into “the dominant expression of radical thinking among educated men and women”,
What mistake did the Guardian make in 1948 and 1951?
They disparaged the foundation of the NHS. They went as far as backing the Conservatives in the election
What two quotes famously came out of the centenary essay?
“comment is free, but facts are sacred”, and decreed that “the voice of opponents no less than that of friends has a right to be heard”
How are journalists becoming trusted?
“journalism has had a greater shift towards social inclusivity than any other profession.”
Although, the Guardian still wants its staff team to be more diverse
How is the Guardian looking to face up to crises in our society today, which reflect the revolutionary mood of the Peterloo Massacre?
embrace as wide a range of progressive perspectives as possible. We will support policies and ideas, but we will not give uncritical backing to parties or individuals. We will also engage with and publish voices from the right. In an age of tumultuous change, nobody has a monopoly on good ideas.
Why are people around the world increasingly moving to the Guardian
As trust in the media declines, people around the world are going to the Guardian’s website and app in greater numbers than ever before, because they are rigorous and fair. Today our priority is to ensure that “facts are sacred”. Their ownership structure means they are entirely independent and free from political and commercial influence.
What is the average household income of a Guardian reader compared to the average UK person?
Guardian reader average: £40,800
average UK person: 38,000
What language on the Guardian’s about us page makes them seem like they really care about their reader, making their mode of address more sophisticated?
‘Only our values determine the stories we choose to cover - relentlessly and courageously’ - this suggests they will go to any length to protect the reader and give them journalism that discovers the truth
Who is the chief editor of the Guardian?
Katharine Viner
What is The Guardian’s monthly digital readership?
21.1 m
Which Prime Ministers did the Guardian heavily support and why?
Tony Blair because he was willing to confront real problems with his progressive and practical agenda. In 2010, they supported the Liberal Democrats and since then they have backed Labour and Corbyn
What was the headline of the paper the day before and after the UK left the EU?
Day before: small island takes the biggest gamble in a generation
After: ‘The day we said goodbye’
This was reinforced was a caption saying ‘missing you already’ and a bulldog at the top of the paper looking sad and regretful
What is an example of an anti-Conservative story in the Guardian?
Fury as PM tells Tories to back ‘bully’ Patel
In 2020, how many digital subscribers did the Guardian gain?
The Guardian gained 268,000 new digital subscriptions and recurring contributions 2020 – that’s an increase of 43%, and a joining rate of one person every two minutes.
