One of the most curious headlines published by Folha in recent days is from Folhinha ( the newspaper supplement focused on kids): "Section 'An adult answers' excuses itself in order to help a 50-year-old reader looking for information that not even Google has." The information, which Google now has through the newspaper, is "What is the name of the ball on the Brazilian flag". The section, as the title reveals, is dedicated to answering questions sent by children. In an era when search engines are starting to write their own entries, thanks to artificial intelligence (and the opportunism of manipulating the country's legislative debate), it sounds like a contradiction, but it is not.

For the same reason, monthly, The New York Times for Kids circulates in the US. The children's supplement of one of the most important periodicals in the world exists only in print, with no equivalent version on its tentacular website. Newspapers, out of delirium or principle, need to attract new readers, even if the competition for their attention with the technology embedded in pockets and purses is often inglorious.

Last week, Folha relaunched Folhateen, an innovative section aimed at teenagers, which formed a generation of readers and young journalists in the 1990s and 2000s. Not a section, a channel, once the lexicon needs to indicate a completely digital product, according to an article in the newspaper published on Tuesday (16). The idea, as in the original version, is to have material of interest to those who have already outgrown Folhinha, but are still too young to face the regular news.

Manifestations on social networks and messages from readers celebrated the return. People shared memories of how they used to steal the supplement from the newspaper at the school library or that they started listening to Arctic Monkeys on the recommendation of one of its columnists.

The good memories are from adults, not teenagers, an audience that will now have to be hunted with interaction and stories that make sense in their universes, also according to the introduction text. Interestingly enough, the channel has made an email address available for contact and topics suggestion, which sounds anachronistic even for those who have already left adolescence in recent years.

It is interesting to see Folha rehabilitating its brands, but there are rescues that are possible and others not so much. Folhinha is a good example of this trend. Resumed during the pandemic for obvious reasons, it not only kept but created new paths, with articles for children to face alone and others to be read together with adults; a quiz section, math puzzles, and a trivia column. A microcosm separated in the print issue on a detachable page, an important step (an issue with Anitta on the cover of the Ilustrada and Folhinha on the back cover of the same supplement generated noise).

Equilíbrio, an important brand in the trajectory of the product, currently works more as a label. It brings interesting articles and stories leveraged by social networks, but without an editing set that makes sense. Translations of foreign publications often deal with distant realities. In almost nothing, it resembles the tabloid that had a life of its own within the newspaper.

The supplement Turismo is also a far cry from its original memory, a classic by Folha, which nowadays exchanges its previous deep dives for puddles of information. The limiting parameter seems to be industry blogs and websites. The newspaper bets on adapting itself to the market, when it should, in the readers' minds, do differently.

The self-dubbed 'Orphans of the Guia da Folha ' will put their favorite product in the same pigeonhole, but the issue, in this case, looks different. Folha has recalibrated its production with interesting initiatives, but what the reading audience really misses is the format and the ample service.

The Globo newspaper also realigned this flank of its cultural coverage but dared to follow the opposite path of its São Paulo competitor, with the publication of a weekly printed supplement, RioShow.

Champion of complaints alongside Guia, Esporte also had its priorities resized. There is no more regular coverage of competitions, just features, and special articles on various subjects. It works well until the unscheduled news takes hold, as it has done in recent weeks.

Intensive keeping up was never a direction to follow, to the point that PVC ( Folha's sports columnist), before becoming a columnist for this daily, used to joke that Folha was the best newspaper on sports policy in the world and probably the only one. This best newspaper on sports policy no longer exists, as evidenced by the lackluster coverage of the A-series players of the Brazilian Championship involved in the betting case. It is the biggest scandal in Brazilian football since the CBF-Nike Inquiry and its serious consequences, which generated many scoops for Folha and even an Esso Award for the newspaper. Nothing indicates that the same feat will be repeated.

The sentimental relationship of readers with its products is one of the newspaper's assets. This is due to Folha's good delivery back then. It has become immediately passive, however, not providing anything beyond the basics in the present.

Jose Henrique Mariante

An engineer and journalist, he was a reporter, correspondent, editor, and secretary at Folha, where he has worked since 1991. He is the ombudsman.

_{Translated by Cassy Dias}