Tasha Harrison

The outcome of Murdoch’s paywall experiment with the Times will have a huge impact on journalism. I have spent a lot of time changing my mind about whether Murdoch is a genius or has lost touch with modern media. Finally, the paywall is here.

Today Murdoch was full of praise for tablets and, inparticular, Apple’s iPad, stating that they are ‘a perfect platform’ to read news on. This is true and it is almost certainly the future for most newspapers once the paper format is extinct. The Guardian iPhone and iPad app is one of the best examples of this.

This leads me to think that Murdoch is actually very clever. He does understand modern marketing and the internet. He also understands business and the need to make money. While many journalists and newspaper owners are happy to watch and hope that it works, Murdoch is busy actually doing it. For someone who had the foresight to be the first to enter the satellite television market with just a few thousand viewers, you have to give him the benefit of the doubt when it comes to forming future trends.

For more analysis of the data and how it’s going read this: http://www.beehivecity.com/newspapers/times-paywall-more-analysis-of-the-data191807/

While the newspaper industry continues to debate the pros and cons of paywalls, Stewart Kirkpatrick, former editor of scotsman.com, has launched the first ever web-only daily. Named after Scotland’s oldest newspaper, The Caledonian Mercury, caledonianmercury.com challenges the perception that the internet will spell the death of the newspaper. By offering high quality journalism, it hopes to attract readers and advertisers through the quality of its content.

There has been much debate about whether such a venture can succeed given the damage the internet has done to the industry. With sites like the BBC and Sky News continuing to offer free news will there be a place for niche news sites? I think the problem that the Caledonian Mercury is going to have is that it is competing against many other niche news sites that won’t have the same overheads – the Scottish publication is going to be paying journalists, including many former staff from the Scotsman.

There are also question marks over the professionalism of the design. Built in WordPress, the site doesn’t exude the same professionalism as the majority of its competitors. Simplicity is always a good starting point, but the curious logo and tag clouds give it more the image of a blog. Perhaps this is what they had planned, but in the longterm it is a concern that they just come across as another blog.

It’s a great idea, but I’m worried that their approach may just prove that blogs will replace newspapers for well written and thoughtful commentary.

Yesterday The Guardian released it’s new app for the iPhone. It costs £2.39, is highly personalised and allows you to listen to podcasts and browse images. The Guardian does have a very good mobile site, but I downloaded the app as I wanted to see whether it would be worth £2.39, which is quite a lot for an app. First impressions are that it makes browsing a lot easier and I can organise it into the sections I read the most. It is a definite improvement, but not completely life changing.

The Guardian are leading the way in monetising the news. I don’t have to download the app to read the paper, I could go on reading it from the web browser, but the app makes it a lot easier and the customisation is great. They have added value to their service and I am willing to pay. It’s a lot like upgrading your Spotify so you don’t receive adverts.

The Guardian recognise, more than any other British newspaper, the need to work with their readers to turn around their declining profits. Instead of rushing backwards to an old model of charging people to read the news (ie what Murdoch is proposing) they have accepted that information on the internet is free. The amount of content that is published everyday has reduced the value of news. Before the internet, everyone had to buy a paper or magazine to gather information and opinions. Now it’s free.

I’ve spoken before about the fact that this is a huge problem for newspapers. The Guardian have reacted by adding value to the experience of reading news on their website. They have subscription services, but they don’t charge for the basic news. They also don’t make a big song and dance of it (like Murdoch), they simply offer these services as a way to add value.

It is too soon to know which model will work, a paywall system, where you must subscribe to read beyond a certain point, or an added value service, where you pay for a better experience. I suspect that the latter will be the more successful.

Rupert Murdoch has declared war on Google. He has long accused the search giant of being responsible for the decline in the newspaper industry. Murdoch now wants to remove his sites from the Google index. He will start charging for content next year and is looking to do a deal with Microsoft for content to appear on Bing.

Murdoch has a massive problem. Less people are buying his newspapers, because the content is free online, and if he starts charging for content people can simply get their news from another source. If he removes his sites from Google he will reduce the number of visitors, which in turn will effect the advertising revenue on the sites. His competitors will still offer news for free – unless he can pursuade them to join him on Bing, behind a pay wall. And then, of course, there’s the BBC, who will not only continue to offer free content, but keep creating better and better online services.

I think that there is a chance that Murdoch’s plan could work, in the end something has to change.  He does have a knack of not only making a great deal of money, but also of forcing consumers to buy his products – how many sports fans have given up being angry about having to pay for Sky Sports and view it as an essential, a little bit like paying your gas bill?

Last week Rupert Murdoch announced that his newspapers would start charging for online content.  One of the main challenges News Corp will face is that the majority of their competition is offering the same product for free.  All of the big UK newspapers have free content, so the only hope that Murdoch has of making money is that either people are willing to pay for his content, or that his competitors start charging as well.  His belief may be that eventually other newspapers will realise that they have to charge in order to make any money and that his decision will save the industry.

The big problem facing newspapers is that people can read news online for free.  They no longer have to buy a newspaper to find out what’s happening in the world.  The online news is more up to date, sometimes instant.  The way people receive news is changing, the internet offers real time information.  Blogging and micro-blogging are creating a whole new type of journalism, where anyone can report an event almost instantaneously.  Blogs give us the opinions of not only a selected few journalists, but of regular people, not influenced by editors who need stories that sell.

In his book, Flat Earth News, Nick Davies explains how Fleet Street has become increasingly corrupted by the need to make money.  Fewer journalists covering less space has led to a greater reliance on news and PR agencies, which has led to the rapid deterioration of the quality of our news.

The internet has simply highlighted the plight of an industry already struggling.  The same news stories are repeated across all the major news outlets, usually taken from the same copy written by a single journalist at the associated press.  Many people now receive their news through a Google newsfeed on their iGoogle homepage or from a real time micro-blogging feed such as Twitter.  With sites such as the BBC able to offer free news as a public service, online newspapers don’t really stand much of a chance in the longterm. But far from being the fault of the internet, it is simply their inability to react to a fast changing world.

Read “Is Murdoch’s Plan to Charge for Online News Doomed?” for an excellent insight into how the subscription system could work.