Includes: - A brief history of The Guardian newspaper - Examples of early texts - The primary audience of The Guardian - How technology impacts form and audience - The future for newspapers

1. The Guardian

2. Brief History of The Guardian:
• The Guardian is a daily newspaper.
• The Guardian was a broadsheet newspaper from 1821 – 2005, then
became a compact newspaper from 2005 – 2018, and since 2018, The
Guardian has been a compact newspaper.
• The owners of The Guardian is Guardian Media Group, and this group
also publish the newspaper.
• The founder of The Guardian is John Edward Taylor, and the newspaper
was founded on 5th May 1821.
• The current editor-in-chief is Katharine Viner.
• The political alignment of The Guardian newspaper is centre-left.

3. Brief History of The Guardian:
• The Guardian was originally called The Manchester Guardian. It changed
its name to The Guardian in 1959.
• The Guardian is a part of the Guardian Media Group, which is owned by
the Scott Trust. The trust was created in 1936 to “secure the financial and
editorial independence of The Guardian in perpetuity and to safeguard the
journalistic freedom and liberal values of The Guardian free from
commercial or political interference.”
• Once the Scott Trust became a limited company in 2008, a constitution
was written to maintain the same protections for The Guardian as before.
• Profits made by the company are reinvested in journalism rather than
given out to owners or shareholders.

4. Brief History of The Guardian:
• Since 2018, the paper’s main newsprint sections have been printed in
tabloid format.
• The newspaper has an online edition, as well as two international websites
(Guardian Australia and Guardian US).
• The paper’s readership is usually mainstream left of British political
opinion, and has a reputation as a platform for social liberal and left-wing
readers.

5. Brief History
of The
Guardian:
• In 1988, The Guardian
had a redesign, splitting
the newspaper into two
sections and
introducing a new
masthead. An
international edition is
launched in Europe.

6. Examples of
Early Texts:
• These are front covers of The Guardian
magazine each time they have had a redesign.
• The most noticeable things that have changed in
these front covers are the masthead fonts and the
positions of the images.

7. The Original Target Audience:
• The Guardian newspaper targets a well-educated, relatively young,
predominantly male and liberal audience centred around London. 52% of
The Guardian readers are male, and the average reader is 44 years old.
• They take an interest in politics, exhibitions, and international news. Other
areas of interest common to typical Guardian readers include women’s
issues, culture, the arts, human rights charities, and general information
about London. They are more likely to own a cat than any other pet. Their
politics are somewhat to the left of others in their demographic, which is
somewhat right to the rest of Britain.

8. Technological Impact on Newspapers:
• Media has advanced further online and almost anything can be accessible
through the internet. Therefore, newspapers such as The Guardian have
produced and distributed their news stories across several different types
of media, by creating a website that can be accessed on any device.
• Due to people being able to access these easier online, the circulation of
The Guardian has decreased, as less people are buying physical copies.
• However, due to the news being readily available, the audience
demographic has changed for The Guardian (as well as a lot of other
newspapers), and they now have a younger demographic interacting with
their website.

9. What is the future for newspapers?
• It has been predicted many times that in the near future, print newspaper
will disappear and will all be online.
• This is due to phones becoming more popular and the circulation of
newspapers gradually decreasing over time.
• More people are reading news articles on their phones, and find it more
convenient due to buying a physical print copy of a newspaper takes up
time – it is much quicker to research something online.