UK newspaper websites The Times and Sunday Times have this morning completed their transition to being paid-for services.
From mid-June, users were asked to register free to read articles at the websites but now it’s a case of pay up or move on. Visit TheTimes.co.uk, for example, and you’ll see what looks like the normal website. Try to click on a story, though and you’re presented with this:
Readers currently have the choice of £1 per day for access to the site, or a promotional rate of £1 for 30 days’ access. Users who take this promotional rate will be bumped onto a £2 per week subscription once the trial period is over. Those who subscribe to the tradition newspaper version of The Times get access to the site included in their current subscription.
As we recently reported, figures show traffic to The Times has almost halved since requiring registration to read stories began. We imagine that the drop will continue but as long as the number of users wiling to pay is high enough to turn a profit, owner Rupert Murdoch won’t be complaining.
Next to disappear behind a paywall will be Murdoch’s UK tabloid titles The Sun and News of the World. Given their more downmarket nature, charging for access to the website might be a harder sell.
There are no RSS feeds on the Times site. Since I follow my favourite papers now via feeds, I don’t go there any more, unless via a 3rd party link. I’m not sure if that’ll change.
Newspapers without paywalls are going to be like shops where people only browse and never buy – the business model doesn’t work. Worse, the more readers you get, the more your hosting/bandwith costs rise yet there is no increase in income.
The blogosphere might not like it but full time writers and journalists need to be paid and online adverts don’t generate enough cash. I blogged about this in respect of model making magazines some time ago (http://philsworkbench.blogspot.com/2010/04/is-web-future.html) and haven’t changed my mind despite all the media fuss.
I suspect Rupe is hoping that increased traffic on his competitiors websites will make their financial problems even worse and they are all bruning money fast at present.