Some things are universal.

Saturday, January 26, 2002

Some things are universal. The enjoyment of food, for instance, is something we all share. Fear of tigers is basically another one. The telvision show ER – even though it’s about three years past the point of watchability – is still, mysteriously, almost universally popular.

I should have already known, but over the last two weeks I have learned what is not universal: Humor, in general, and the Tribune’s comics page, specifically.

Two Fridays ago, the Tribune distributed in the paper a survey about our weekday comics page. You may have been one of the 492 people who mailed, faxed or dropped off your bright pink form.

We asked readers to rank the comic strips from one through eight, with one being their favorite and eight their least favorite. We also asked if we should change the content of the weekday comics page, and asked which of the four non-comics features – Dear Abby, horoscopes, crossword puzzle and bridge column – the reader used at least once a week.

As these forms arrived at the Tribune office, and as they were tabulated, I noticed a strange pattern. Some of my favorite comic strips were ranking low. I couldn’t understand it. I was so sure my favorites were the funniest. But 492 other people had their own opinions, and few of them were exactly the same; everybody reads the comics page differently, and enjoys different parts of it.

So it was clear I would not find some kind of consensus. I did, however, notice a few patterns that were either interesting to note or persusasive enough to bring about changes.

Some of the observations we made after tabulating the results:

– The most popular comics were Peanuts, Garfield and Hagar the Horrible. Peanuts, still going strong a couple of years after creator Charles Schultz died, was the runaway winner as our most popular comic strip on weekdays.

– The least popular were Sally Forth, Dilbert and Willy N Ethel. These three were significantly behind the rest of the pack, seeming to single them out as the clear losers.

– Dear Abby is an incredibly popular feature. Of the people who responded, an amazing 87 percent said they read Dear Abby at least once a week. I can’t think of many other parts of the paper that likely get that kind of loyal readership.

– The horoscopes are used by 51.2 percent of our respondents at least once a week, and the crossword puzzle is used by 36.6 percent.

– The bridge column was the least popular feature, despite the enthusiastic support of some of the respondents (a few made special notations about how much they and their friends like it). Only 8.1 percent of the people who responded said they use it once a week. Since the response was most likely skewed toward regular comics-page readers, I can only deduce that the overall percentage of readers who enjoy the feature is even less.

I have nothing against bridge, but it seems that it’s such a specialized hobby that the vast majority of our readers don’t get any enjoyment out of the column. This led us to the decision to discontinue the feature. We will try to offer something with wider appeal by adding two word puzzles instead: cryptoquips and Jumbles.

This is sure to disappoint many bridge enthusiasts, but I hope they understand it’s nothing personal; we just hope to make the paper appealing to a broader range of people by offering features anybody can enjoy.

– As far as changing the comics goes, it’s a tougher decision to make. We asked people for any suggestions about which new comics they’d like to see on weekdays. Some of the most popular requests were Beetle Bailey, Blondie, the Family Circus, Dennis the Menace, Hi and Lois, Pickles, Zits, Arlo N’ Janis, Baby Blues, Close to Home and Crankshaft, among others. All are worthy, but which to add, and which to discontinue? I’ll be agonizing over that decision.

– Some of you requested comics that are no longer available, most notably the Far Side and Calvin and Hobbes. Believe me, if they were still around, these two strips would definitely be part of our page, as they are truly among the best comics ever. Unfortunately, their creators had other ideas, and have retired the strips.

– Lastly, it was amazing to see the large response. People had told me it would be optimistic to expect more than a 2- or 3-percent reponse to a survey like this; it turned out that 6.8 percent responded. That tells me that people out there are very interested in the comics page.

Or maybe they were interested in that $50 prize. Which reminds me, we will annnounce the winner next week.

Dylan Belden is the Tribune’s managing editor. His column appears Sundays. E-mail him at dylan.belden@albertleatribune.com.