The London Paper (defunct)

It was launched by News International in September 2006. Surprisingly, it was the first newspaper News International had launched; all its other titles had been acquisitions of existing publications.

From the outset it was in direct competition with the Evening Standard, which was then owned by Associated Newspapers. It was apparently successful in capturing a large part of the market; the Standard‘s circulation had dropped slightly from 300,000 to 287,000 by December 2008, but only just over half of the print run was sold at full price. In that same month the Standard went from three to two editions and cut the number of newsagents it distributed to, before being sold to Russian print mogul Aleksandr Lebedev in January 2009.

Like the morning freesheet Metro, it contained mostly celebrity and entertainment gossip rather than hard news. It also attracted some criticism as being little more than a very thinly veiled advertorial vehicle for other products from Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp empire.

It ceased publication with its 18 September 2009 issue, having consistently made a loss. The website has since been taken down.