In these days of proliferating media, there are free newspapers everywhere: on the trains, in your letterbox, blowing all over the streets. They are difficult to get away from. Most notably, when one is wrapped around your shins in a gale.
It is gratifying to know that, in this age of runaway capitalism, there are some people who want to give us the news for free.
There is now something handy to reach for on a train journey, and which you can leave for the next passenger to read, who in turn leaves it for the next, who leaves it crumpled on the floor for the cleaner to pick up. Most recently, Dubliners have had two utterly distinct, competing free newspapers to pick from: the, er, blue one and the red one. Either of them is helpful, at least, in keeping you from going crazy when standing on the train with your nose pressed into somebody's armpit. They prove a distraction from yelling schoolchildren on the bus, and, if nothing else, some people seem to find them convenient to hide behind, so they don't have to give their seat to that heavily pregnant woman.
It's an interesting development, because for some time, people have been telling us that free news on the internet was a threat to the traditional print newspaper. So far, this has proven to be wide of the mark, not least because it's so hard to find a plug socket for your PC on the bus. However, it has been met with the rise of the freesheet, most obviously through the plethora of them that drop through our doors every week. With such titles as the West People's Gazette or South Leader's People, they take us back to the early days of the newspaper, most obviously the ones when there were more ads than news on the front page.
To be fair, they successfully adapt the traditional local newspaper elements: some news; some outrage; horoscopes; property; at least one picture of a county councillor standing in a neglected playground; and "Pub People!", two dozen photos of drunk people taken in a local nightclub. To that, they delicately add just enough advertising content to almost, but not quite, bury the news, stuffing it with notices for plumbers, shops and countless ads that tell us how we can advertise with the paper. They are often extremely successful.
In fact, there is a fear that the freesheets will dislodge the traditional newspapers. If that ever happens, it could mean journalists having to double as ad salesmen. That would be a very sad day indeed.
By the way, this column is sponsored by Kut-Price Cola