Big News ! The Christian Science Monitor is about to become the first national newspaper in the US to go web only.
Its ditching print after 100 years and had a circulation as high as 220,000 in the 1970s, but now sells around 52,000 copies each day, while the website attracts 1.5m visitors a month.
It is forecast to lose $18.9m in the year ending April 30. The switch to web-only publication is projected to help cut this loss to $10.5m by 2013.
It is a development that will be watched closely by other newspaper publishers already struggling to maintain circulation levels and now facing the added threat of a significant fall in advertising revenue in 2009.
However, because the Monitor is run as a non-profit business, and is subsidised, its experience is somewhat different to most newspapers.
The end of the Christian Science Monitor as a daily newspaper comes at a tough time for the US newpaper industry as hundreds lose their jobs across the country.
Yesterday, Tribune Co's Los Angeles Times announced it was to cut 10% of its editorial staff, laying-off 75 employees as part of a 200-person reduction that began last week.
The New York Times cut jobs earlier this year and USA Today's owner, Gannett, is also cutting more jobs having announced 120 were to go in August.
The Star-Ledger, the biggest newspaper in New Jersey, said last week it was to make about 40% of its newsroom staff redundant with around 150 jobs going.
Showing posts with label newspapers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label newspapers. Show all posts
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Wednesday, February 07, 2007
World's oldest newspaper goes digital
For centuries, readers thumbed through the crackling pages of Sweden's Post-och Inrikes Tidningar newspaper. No longer.
The world's oldest paper still in circulation has dropped its paper edition and now exists only in cyberspace. The newspaper, founded in 1645 by Sweden's Queen Kristina, became a Web-only publication on Jan. 1. It's a fate, many ink-stained writers and readers fear, that may await many of the world's most venerable journals. ``We think it's a cultural disaster,'' said Hans Holm, who served as the chief editor of Post-och Inrikes Tidningar for 20 years. ``It is sad when you have worked with it for so long and it has been around for so long.''
Queen Kristina used the publication to keep her subjects informed of the affairs of state, Holm said, and the first editions, which were more like pamphlets, were carried by courier and posted on note boards in cities and towns throughout the kingdom. Today, Post-och Inrikes Tidningar, which means mail and domestic tidings, runs legal announcements by corporations, courts and certain government agencies - about 1,500 a day according to Olov Vikstrom, the current editor. The paper edition was certainly not some mass- market tabloid.
It had a meager circulation of only 1,000 or so, although the Web site is expected to attract more readers, Vikstrom said. The newspaper is owned by the Swedish Academy, known for awarding the annual Nobel Prize in Literature. But it recently sold the publishing rights to the Swedish Companies Registration Office, a government agency.
Despite its online transformation, Post-och Inrikes Tidningar remains No. 1 on a ranking of the oldest newspapers still in circulation compiled by the Paris- based World Association of Newspapers. ``An online newspaper is still a newspaper, so we'll leave it on the list,'' WAN spokesman Larry Kilman said.
The world's oldest paper still in circulation has dropped its paper edition and now exists only in cyberspace. The newspaper, founded in 1645 by Sweden's Queen Kristina, became a Web-only publication on Jan. 1. It's a fate, many ink-stained writers and readers fear, that may await many of the world's most venerable journals. ``We think it's a cultural disaster,'' said Hans Holm, who served as the chief editor of Post-och Inrikes Tidningar for 20 years. ``It is sad when you have worked with it for so long and it has been around for so long.''
Queen Kristina used the publication to keep her subjects informed of the affairs of state, Holm said, and the first editions, which were more like pamphlets, were carried by courier and posted on note boards in cities and towns throughout the kingdom. Today, Post-och Inrikes Tidningar, which means mail and domestic tidings, runs legal announcements by corporations, courts and certain government agencies - about 1,500 a day according to Olov Vikstrom, the current editor. The paper edition was certainly not some mass- market tabloid.
It had a meager circulation of only 1,000 or so, although the Web site is expected to attract more readers, Vikstrom said. The newspaper is owned by the Swedish Academy, known for awarding the annual Nobel Prize in Literature. But it recently sold the publishing rights to the Swedish Companies Registration Office, a government agency.
Despite its online transformation, Post-och Inrikes Tidningar remains No. 1 on a ranking of the oldest newspapers still in circulation compiled by the Paris- based World Association of Newspapers. ``An online newspaper is still a newspaper, so we'll leave it on the list,'' WAN spokesman Larry Kilman said.
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