Abstract
The internet provides worldwide access to more than 3,000 on-line newspapers serving an estimated daily audience of 80 million readers. This study, one of the first of its kind, uses World Wide Web traffic access logs and other audience measurement tools to analyse usage trends of an on-line newspaper. Analysis of Knight Ridder's Philadelphia Online <http://www.phillynews.com>, the web site of the Philadelphia (PA) Inquirer and Daily News, from November 1995 to May 1997 indicates that most readers accessed the site from their offices: the highest traffic occurred on weekdays, with the steepest spike around noon, dropping by half during evenings and weekends. The study also found that web traffic increased 874 per cent over 18 months; users spent an average of fewer than 14 minutes per visit, viewing an average of seven pages each time; and most users accessed the site from commercial (38 per cent), network (29.9 per cent) or educational (24.1 per cent) domains.
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