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Free daily newspapers trace their history back to the 1940s when Walnut Creek, California publisher Dean Lesher began what is widely believed to be the first free daily, now known as the Contra Costa Times . In the 1960s, he converted that newspaper and three others in the same county to paid circulation. In the early 1970s, in Boulder, Colorado , regents at the University Of Colorado kicked the student-run Colorado Daily off campus because of editorials against the Vietnam War . Regents hoped the paper would die; instead it began to focus on the community as a free tabloid published five days a week. In the next couple of decades, a number of free dailies opened in Colorado . Not coincidentally, most were started by University of Colorado graduates. Free dailies opened in Aspen (1979, 1988), Vail (1984), Breckenridge (1990), Glenwood Springs (1990); Grand Junction (1995); Steamboat Springs (1990) and Telluride (1991). In 1995, the founders of free dailies in Aspen and Vail teamed up to start the Palo Alto Daily News in Palo Alto, California , a city about 20 miles south of San Francisco. The Palo Alto paper was profitable within nine months of its launch, and usually carries more than 100 different retail (non classified) ads per day. The "Palo Alto Daily News Model" has been copied a number of times over the years, including by four San Francisco Bay Area publications -- the San Francisco Examiner, the San Mateo Daily Journal , the Berkeley Daily Planet (which opened in 1999 and folded in 2001 and was reopened as a twice-a-week paper by new owners in 2004) and the Contra Costa Examiner (which opened and closed in 2004). The publishers of the Palo Alto Daily News ( Aspen Times Daily founding editor Dave Price (journalist) , and Vail Daily founder Jim Pavelich) have since launched successful free dailies in San Mateo, California (2000), Redwood City, California (2000), Burlingame, California (2000), Los Gatos, California (2002), Denver, Colorado (2002), and Berkeley, California (2006). Each goes by the "Daily News" name with the city's name in front, such as " Denver Daily News ." The Palo Alto Daily News Model distributes papers to public places such as coffee shops, restaurants, stores, gyms, schools, corporate campuses and news racks. Price and Pavelich have avoided putting the content of their newspapers online because they were concerned it would reduce circulation, and they believe ads in a printed newspaper are more effective than ads online. In 1995, the same year the Palo Alto Daily News began, Metro started what may be the first free daily Newspaper distributed through Public Transport in Stockholm, Sweden . Later, Metro launched free papers in the Czech Republic (1996); Hungary (1998); the Netherlands and Finland (1999); Chile , USA , Italy , Canada , Poland , Greece , Argentina , Switzerland and the UK (2000); Spain and Denmark (2001); France , Hong Kong and Korea (2002); and Portugal (2004). According to the Metro web site (see external links), 42 daily Metro editions are published in 63 major cities in 17 countries in 16 languages. However, not every Metro launch was a success, operations in Switzerland , Argentina and the UK were ended after some time while an afternoon free paper in Stockholm was closed within a few months. Metro International is now based in Luxemburg while the company's headquarters are in London . All Metro editions can be downloaded (in Pdf -format) from their local website or from the special Metro-download page (see external links). FREE DAILIES TODAY In less than 10 years these papers have been introduced in almost every European country and in several markets in the United States, Canada, South America, Australia and Asia. There are now (Winter 2005) free newspapers in 36 countries - in two countries (Germany & Japan) free daily newspapers have ceased to exist. Market leader Metro distributes 7 million copies daily, while other companies publish 14 million copies. These 22 million copies are read by at least 45 million people daily. ENTREPRENEURS Since 2000, many free dailies have been introduced including three in Hong Kong and three in Vancouver, B.C. Besides Metro, another successful publisher is Norwegian 's Schibsted . In Switzerland , Spain and France it publishes ' 20 Minutes ', the name indicating the amount of time people need to read it. Schibsted also had some disappointments. A German version had to be taken from the market after a bitter newspaper war with local publishers in Cologne , while an Italian edition never saw the streets because of legal matters (non- EU companies could not control Italian Media firms, this did not prevent the Italian market to become flooded with free newspapers). The Schibsted-editions have a total circulation of 1.7 million. LEGAL BATTLES In almost every European market where free newspapers were introduced there have been lawsuits on every possible ground, from unfair competition to littering, from the Right on the name Metro to quarrels over the right to be distributed through public transport. This kind of distribution is by no means the only way free papers are distributed, racks in busy places like Shopping Center s, Universities , restaurants ( McDonald's ), and Hospital s, and delivery by hand on the street, outside railway stations or door-to-door, are also used. In the United States, the owners of the Philadelphia Inquirer, Philadelphia Daily News and New York Times sued the Southeast Pennsylvania Transit Authority over an exclusive deal it made with Metro to distribute its papers on the agency's commuter trains. Metro won the suit but is losing the newspaper war; the free daily has struggled to win advertisers. Of Metro's five North American papers (Philadelphia, New York, Toronto, Vancouver and Boston), only its Boston edition is said to be making money. It appears that Metro has stopped expanding in North America. NEWSPAPER WARS The , the UK , Singapore , Melbourne , Austria , Argentina and Iceland . However, also in other markets ( France , Switzerland , the Netherlands , Korea , Denmark , Finland , Italy , USA ) local publishers have a substantial market share. In some French and Italian markets three titles are competing, in Seoul ( Korea ) there were six titles in October 2004. READERSHIP While the traditional newspaper has problems to attract the younger audience, free daily newspapers usually have a readership that is much younger than that of the traditional newspaper. Metro International claims that 70 % of the Metro-readers are under 45 . Knight Ridder, which acquired the Palo Alto Daily News in 2005, found in a 2004 survey that 57% of the paper's readers are under 45. CONTENT & FORMAT Most free newspapers are published as tabloids, is some countries however they are even smaller, for instance in Argentina and Austria . 20 Minutes is published in a magazine format. Although 24 pages seems to be the average for Metro, some papers are thinner (12 to 16 pages) while others have up to 64 pages (the Metro UK Friday edition). The Palo Alto Daily News, however, ranges from 56 to 120 pages per day. Content reflects the audience: a clear focus on quick news (local, national and international), life style, Technology , Media , Celebrities , Movies and information ( Weather , Comic s, Horoscope s, TV guides, Movie and Theatre listings, Crossword s, etc.). CANNIBALISM Free newspapers may hurt the sales of traditional newspapers. This could have harmful societal effects because of the important role newspapers play in a Democracy . Figures indicate that many readers of free newspapers are indeed "new" readers or read both paid and free papers. Research by Belgian, UK and US free dailies indicate that half of their readers only read free dailies. There seems to be a negative effect on single copy sales, but the overall effect does not indicate a great deal of cannibalism. TABLOIDIZATION The success of the new free daily newspaper has no doubt inspired other publishers into me-to products. These products are not always free daily newspapers. In some countries free weeklies or semiweeklies have been launched ( Norway , France , Russia , Portugal , Poland ). In Moscow the semiweekly (in October 2004 expanded to three times a week) is also called Metro. In the Netherlands there is a local free weekly published four times a week. Also it is very likely that the rapid tabloidization in Europe (UK, Ireland , Sweden , Belgium , the Netherlands) has something to do with the success of the free Tabloid s. In Germany there are now four so-called compact cheap newspapers. TIMELINE
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