Newspaper Numbers

I poked around online and came up with a cursory number, as a round conversion factor, 500 words is roughly 12 column inches in old-school newspaper terms.

One source suggested 500 words was 12.5 to 14.5 column inches, depending on paper particulars.

Don’t blame me, when I first started typesetting on a Mac, line height was called “leading.” As a further nod to old-school, hot-lead artifacts, the way the period, or any punctuation, is tucked inside the quote, or double quote, mark? All goes back to hand setting type.

While my daily blog output varies wildly, the weekly has been safe at +/- 2,500 words per week for over a decade now.

That an unofficial estimate at a good 60 column inches in a week. Steady production for over a decade now.