The article says the list is "based on their circulation and popularity." Circulation for Watchtower and Awake includes all the many thousands that are not placed in the field and that end up stacked up in JWs' homes, the many thousands that are placed, but, never read and that end up in the trash, and the many thousands that JWs get, but, don't themselves read... also, the stacks that are left at laundromats, those left under doormats at not-at-homes, etc.
The sad thing is that if it was a bunch of mags that were counted by the number that wholesalers buy, but that never get sold to the public, JWs would say “How silly those magazines aren’t popular, none are sold!” Yet that is exactly what is happening to the Awakes....Jehovah’s witnesses are like the wholesalers who buy in bulk but can’t sell them on! They are being duped! They think because no one person or company is making a profit from them it doesn’t mean Watchtower Bible and Tract of Pennsylvania inc. isn’t getting $tinking rich!