For some reason, my dad loves the USA Today. I’ve always argued it’s a fake newspaper that doesn’t really offer any real value. It just regurgitates simple tellings from AP stories. The NY Times and Wall Street Journal provide much more insight on stories. But he also likes reading US Weekly for celebrity gossip on Jennifer Aniston, so I guess reading the USA Today fits that style.

My dad would just argue that the USA Today has the largest circulation, so therefore it was the best. I always argued that just made him a simple lemming following a crowd of partially-educated people. If he wanted real news, he needed to step his game up. But he has, of course, refused.

That’s why it makes me happy to see this table from the Economist. The USA Today has lost it’s #1 ranking, and supposedly it’s title as ‘America’s Newspaper’:

The best part of that graphic? The dispenser has ‘The Decliner’ Photoshopped on the side of it — and there’s a picture of Donovan McNabb at the base. That’s just cruel — and very, very appropriate. Even the Economist thinks Philly sucks.

Those are horrible year-over-year numbers, especially considering the fact that those numbers have been dropping for years. I’m most amazed by the idea that more people subscribe to the Cleveland and Detroit newspapers than the Boston Globe. Boston is a bigger market than those Rust Belt locales, no? Is the Globe just a terrible newspaper, or are Bostonians just more advanced than most in completely ditching print for free news on the internet? Wernick, I’d appreciate your Boston perspective on this.

And Dad, get a new newspaper, or none at all. Everybody’s doing it.

From Economist.com: Poor circulation