Douglas McLennan continues his exploration of mass culture with another provocative blog entry.

Why are People, Us, and Time considered "mass culture" when they sell to less than 1.5 percent of an audience in a country of more than 300 million? And why is The New Yorker, with its 1.1 million readers (granted, a smaller number than People's 3.8 million, but not that much smaller, as McLennan points out, when you consider a marketplace of 300 million) considered niche?

He also cites similar trends in radio, where Rush Limbaugh attracts 14 million listeners, but National Public Radio's Morning Edition gets almost as many -- 13.5 million -- and NPR's All Things Considered gets 13 million. (Fascinating numbers unto themselves). But, again, McLennan adds perspective: Not one of these programs is listened to by even 5 percent of the population.

McLennan ends with this provocation: "if a definition of success of mass culture is the ability to pull audience, then maybe we need to reassess where the true mass culture is when video game sales beat movie sales, public radio beats the socks off the commercial version, and attendance at arts events outstrips the audience for professional sports."

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