The Times online? That will cost you £1
Rupert Murdoch
is to charge users to access the Times and Sunday Times websites in a bid to
reinvent the newspaper economy in the face of declining print readership and
plummeting ad revenues.
From June,
readers will be charged £1 per day or £2 for a
week to access both papers' websites. Access will be included in the seven-day
subscriptions of print customers to the Times and Sunday Times.
Murdoch has
spent the best part of a year planning a strategy to erect paywalls, an issue
that has polarised the UK newspaper industry, which recorded a fall of more
than £700m in ad revenues last
year as the recession took its toll.
Times Newspapers
is losing £240,000 a
day and Murdoch is willing to take a significant hit on its digital readership,
about 20 million unique users a month, in the belief that a smaller, more
valuable audience lies over the paywall.
"Clearly,
we are going to lose a lot of passing traffic," said James Harding, the
Times editor. "We have, like a few other national newspapers, tens of
millions of unique [web] users a month. But they are not regular readers. They
are more like window shoppers. Instead of just defending a dwindling band of
existing readers, we're aiming to reach out to a world of people who want to
get information and ideas but not from the printed page."
To date the only
newspapers to have found some success charging for access to content online
have been the Financial Times and the Wall Street Journal. Both have targeted a
niche, high-end business consumer. Murdoch's move will make the Times and
Sunday Times the first UK papers to fully charge for digital content.
When Murdoch
took over the WSJ's parent, Dow Jones, for $5.6bn in 2007 he flirted with the
idea of taking down its paywall in favour of pursuing a purely ad-funded model
online. However, the downturn crystallised a belief in the need to diversify
revenue streams.
When Murdoch
indicates a change in strategy, the media industry takes notice. The New York
Times followed suit by announcing a hybrid "metered" online pay model
timed to launch next year.
Yet despite
Murdoch's often prescient moves in the market ? he surprised observers by
latching on to social networking early and acquiring MySpace for a relative
snip at $580m in 2005 ? there are many who believe charging online is
impossible. The existence of the BBC and Google has made most content readily
accessible.
News
International's blueprint was announced a day after the Russian oligarch
Alexander Lebedev acquired the Independent and Independent on Sunday for a
nominal £1.
Lebedev has backed a free model for his existing acquisition, the London
Evening Standard, in which he acquired a 75% stake from Lord Rothermere's Daily
Mail & General Trust last year. Lebedev at least initially plans to keep
the Independent titles paid-for, but has not ruled out the possibility of going
free.
Rebekah Brooks,
chief executive of News International, said journalism was facing a defining
moment. She said: "This is just the start," indicating that the Sun
and News of the World would be next to get a pay barrier. "This is a
crucial step towards making the business of news an economically exciting
proposition."
Brooks has some
justification for believing in what Steve Ballmer, chief executive of
Microsoft, termed a "global reset" of the market, which means ad
levels will never recover to buoyant pre-recession levels.
For those
pursuing a primarily ad-funded model, a report on Friday from the media group
Carat indicated continuing tough times. Carat said that globally, every media
type, including TV and radio, would return to advertising growth this year ?
except newspapers and magazines
Referred to: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/mar/26/murdoch-times-website-paywall
Questions
1.
Do you think it is
reasonable to charge for on-line media? If so, how much is it affordable?
2.
When reading, which
media do you prefer paper or on-line?
3.
Do you read any English
paper such as New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Financial Times?
4.
What is your favourite
Korean paper?
5.
When reading paper,
which section are you really interested in?
6.
How much do you trust
Korean mass media?
7.
Can you recognise
mass media manipulated the fact? Tell us any example.
8.
Recently, to choose
news via Internet portal like Naver is common. Let’s talk about this trend.
첫댓글 10분 늦었군요, 죄송 :)
Interesting topic... Wow. So many questions. good~~~~
RVDOLPH 감사합니다. 토요일 날 뵈요~~~~~ ^^