Tasha Harrison

Online Marketing Consultant

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.

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?