Editor Alan Rusbridger greets the newspaper's readers with a front-page salutation: "Welcome to the Berliner Guardian. No, we won't go on calling it that for long, and yes, it's an inelegant name."
The redesigned newspaper, which comes folded to a size smaller than a tabloid, red-top or quality, runs with a lead story about city academy schools. Other headlines include "UK link to terror snatches" and "Police chief blames Orangemen for riots", along with the picture caption of Warne, headlined: "Bad'day mate -- Aussies lose their grip."
Page two is devoted to an index, a column called "Today on the web" and a now ubiquitous Sudoku puzzle.
Addressing the issue of national newspapers being too London-centric, the Berliner Guardian devotes page eight to a digest of news from the regions, with nine nibs.
The centre of the newspaper is given over to a double-page photograph, this time of the aftermath of the rioting in Belfast during weekend.
Fans of The Guardian's G2 features section may be disappointed. Now shrunken and presented as a stapled tabloid section, it does away with Passnotes and features three columns in its first double-page spread -- including one by the Hollywood star Kevin Bacon. It also addresses a daily question, today asking "Is celebrity dead?" (Answer: no).
By contrast, Media Guardian has expanded to a full-sized standalone supplement with a mammoth 36 pages. It leads on how local journalists in New Orleans have covered the story of Hurricane Katrina, and retains favourites such as the Media Monkey diary and My Media.
Buried inside is Roy Greenslade's coverage of the most recent national newspaper figures, somewhat overlooking The Guardian's fall in circulation of 4% in August to 324,790 copies, to highlight difficulties at The Independent and the Independent on Sunday.
As promised, sport gets expanded coverage, with its own supplement. Today's stretches to 20 pages, but the newspaper is guaranteeing at least 12 days coverage every day.
Advertisers getting in on the act including BMW, with a special execution stating: "The pages maybe smaller but sometimes they are harder to turn"; a spot that appeared to be from the media agency PHD, simply showing a bottle of Champagne; Lastminute.com's "shrink to fit" ad; and the publisher Simon & Schuster, which publicises the paperback release of Bob Dylan's 'Chronicles' with an ad saying "Also available in a new format".
The relaunch is being backed with extensive television and poster campaigns. Reaction included Radio 4 'Today' presenter Edward Stourton lamenting the fact it would no longer be useful for toilet training puppies.
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