What Does the News Weigh?

I was surprised by the wispy, feather-light mass of today’s Times Union. Sure, the Monday paper is often insubstantial, but this morning it seemed like the wind might just pick it up and wisk it away.

Got me wondering what that news costs by the pound, so I weighed it. Today’s TU clocked in at 4.75 ounces. Based on the newsstand price of $1.00, that works out to $.21 an ounce, or $3.36 a pound.

For $3.36 you could get half a pound of good turkey breast at the deli, a Starbucks espresso drink, or a couple cans of tuna. Order off the Dollar Menu and you could get a McDouble, fries, and small drink at McDonald’s.

Four and a half ounces of newspaper will keep you busy for twenty minutes, so I suppose this is reasonable.

I’ll be checking this again for the sake of comparison; expect the Thursday paper to really give you some bang for your buck. Weighing other local media is not so simple. It would certainly require special instruments to do it with TV news.

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