Guardian starts with a bang but interest wanes BRITAIN'S The Guardian received a big spike in readers when it launched its long-awaited Australian digital offering last Monday, but early traffic figures obtained by Media indicated that after the initial burst of interest visitor numbers quickly began to trend back towards previous levels. The number of Australian visits to the guardian.co.uk site jumped by about 91,000, or 80 per cent, on launch day from an average of 113,645 visits a day to 204,672, according to data from Experian Hitwise.