He said the paper had been through a "tough period" but was now beginning to grow readership, circulation and market share once again after a heavily marketed redesign last year.
The restructuring will eliminate thousands of newspaper jobs and consolidate pay-TV ownership as the industry's old guard struggles with a major shift to online readership and declining market share for nonsubscription TV broadcasts.
These efforts are intended to capitalize on one main trend -- the burgeoning Hispanic population in the United States, as documented in the 2000 Census -- and to compensate for another -- the sluggish readership and advertising market for mainstream, English-language newspapers.
San Francisco-based CNET Networks has a stable of entertainment and news Web sites, such as CNET, GameSpot.com and TV.com and has expanded readership into emerging markets such as China.
'Serious' newspapers tend to be more serious in tone, politically diverse and have mostly middle-class readerships, while 'middle market' tabloids are comparatively less serious, attracting older, middle-class, right wing readers and tabloid newspapers are also less serious, tend to be more sensationalist, politically diverse and have mostly working-class readership.
What Mr. Van Gelder acquired was a well-known niche publication struggling to maintain readership in a difficult market.
Jacqueline A. Deval, a vice president and the publisher of Hearst Books in New York, had another thought: "The wedding bookshelf is so large because the readership — like the pregnancy market — tends to buy more than one book".
And Mail Online (now rebooting as Daily Mail Online) has a good deal to crow about: unique browser totals hitting 12 million every day, UK readership addressing a monthly market 23.5 million strong, mobile phone followers bounding way over 10 million.
But with a devoted readership -- and lucrative market -- others have given it a try, including, recently, Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Jane Smiley.
