Aftenposten
From Free net encyclopedia
Aftenposten is Norway's second largest newspaper with a circulation of 256,600 copies for the morning edition, 155,400 copies for the separate evening edition and 232,900 copies for the Sunday edition in 2003. The paper was long considered the leading serious Norwegian newspaper. Strong competition in a shrinking market has made the paper move in a more popular direction, however, as signified by the choice of converting from broadsheet to tabloid format in 2005. Today there are few major differences in style or content among Aftenposten and its two main competitors, the Oslo tabloids VG and Dagbladet.
Aftenposten is a private company wholly owned by the public company Schibsted ASA. Aftenposten has approximately 740 employees. Editor-in-chief is Hans Erik Matre (2005).
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Editions
Aftenposten publishes a separate evening edition (called Aftenposten Aften, from February 1 2006 just Aften) from Monday to Friday. It used to be published on Saturdays as well, but this was dropped with the introduction of the Sunday morning edition in 1990. The evening edition focuses more on local news for the Oslo area. Home delivery of the evening edition is limited to the local area and is generally not available at newsstands in other parts of the country. The evening edition has been printed as a tabloid since 1997. Starting in April 2006, Aften will print four localized editions on Thursdays, each focusing on a part of the city of Oslo.
History
Aftenposten was founded by Christian Schibsted May 14, 1860 under the name "Christiania Adresseblad". The year after it got the name Aftenposten. From 1885 the paper has printed two daily editions. The Sunday edition was introduced in 1990.
Historically, Aftenposten labelled itself as "independent, conservative", most closely aligning their editorial platform to the Norwegian Conservative Party, Høyre. This manifested itself in blunt anti-communist opinions during the time between the two world wars. Before and during the Second World War the newspaper had clear fascist sympathies. It was in Aftenposten Knut Hamsun's infamous eulogy over Adolf Hitler was printed, on May 7, 1945.
Editorial line
The newspaper has traditionally been seen as conservative. Some external observers believe that Aftenposten has somewhat moved its editorial line to the left after the end of the Cold War, which can be seen in its criticism of Israel, of the 2003 Invasion of Iraq and of the conservative candidate to become new bishop of Oslo.
In general, Aftenposten articles do not explicitly endorse any political faction in Norwegian politics.
Languages
Aftenposten is published in Riksmål, or Traditional Standard Norwegian, an unofficial but widely used conservative form of the Norwegian language. In 1990 Aftenposten adopted a newer reform of the Riksmål language form. This meant that traditional Riksmål forms such as efter (after), nu (now) sne (snow) and sprog (language) were replaced by newer forms (etter, nå, snø, språk).
The online version of the paper has a large English section, and is one of the favourite sources for Norwegian news in English. These are typically aimed at people of Norwegian descent, especially from the United States, who are interested in Norway but are not fluent in the language.
See also
External links
- Aftenposten in English
- Aftenposten in Norwegian
- Thumb-size picture of the morning front pagede:Aftenposten
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