To argue that The Sun lost its market in Baltimore, he cites the decline in Baltimore city population. But the surrounding Baltimore County and the outer counties of Anne Arundel, Howard, Carroll and Harford are where population rose dramatically. On the whole, the metro region — from which The Sun draws its circulation base, increased significantly in the time period cited by Shafer.

So his premise is non-existent.

The Sun lost readers from a larger pool of them. And the idea that newspapers were worried about losing readers in 1960? Yes, to television. But they actually weathered the maturation of TV news and The Sun increased its circulation significantly and was in a very profitable period in the 1980s and early and mid-1990s. Simon’s argument is that chain ownership merely took those profits and did not reinvest in improving the paper, which was in no better shape to withstand the challenge of the internet’s arrival. Shafer doesn’t deal with this argument in any substantive way that I can discern.