History of Newspapers

Newspaper is a publication that presents and comments on the news. Newspapers play an important role in shaping public opinion and informing people of current events.

The first newspapers were probably handwritten news-sheets posted in public places. The earliest daily newssheet was «Acta Diurna» («Daily Events») which started in Rome in 59 B.C. The first printed newspaper was Chinese publication called «Dibao» («Ti-pao») started in A.D.700’s.*It was printed from carved wooden blocks, The first regularly published newspaper in Europe was «Avisa Relation» or «Zeitung», started in Germany in 1609.

Newspapers have certain advantages over other mass media — magazines, TV and radio. Newspaper can cover more news and in much detail than TV or radio neWcast can do. Magazines focus on major national and international events of the preceeding week. But newspaper focuses on local news as well and provides information and comments faster than magazine can do.

There are about 1700 daily and 7500 weekly newspapers in the US. The circulation of some weeklies is no more than a few hundred of copies per issue and the circulation of some dailies is over a million of copies.

There are daily newspapers and weekly newspapers. Daily newspapers print world, national and local news. Many dailies are morning papers, others are afternoon papers. Sunday issues of the dailies are usually larger than the weekday ones. They may include special sections on such topics as entertainment, finance and travel or Sunday magazine, a guide to TV programmes, coloured comics. The major dailies in the US are «Christian Science Monitor», «New York Times», «USA Today», «Wall Street Journal», «Washington Post».

Weekly newspapers serve usually for smaller areas. They are printed in small communities where people know each other and are interested in activities of their friends and neighbours. Weeklies report of weddings, births, deaths and news of local business and politics. Most weeklies do not print world or national news.