The Boston Globe announced Thursday that the online version of its newspaper will be moving from Boston.com to BostonGlobe.com, and that it will begin charging for full access to the latter beginning the second half of next year.
Print subscribers will automatically have full access to all of The Boston Globe’s daily published content at the new site; others will have to purchase a print or digital-only subscription. The price for the latter has not yet been determined.
Boston.com will transition into a free, local news site, pulling in breaking news, sports, weather and more from a variety of sources — including, of course, some from The Boston Globe. The paper is also developing a number of branded apps and other digital products for smartphones, tablets and other devices, the company announced.
“Our research shows that Boston.com currently attracts several different types of user,” Publisher Christopher Mayer said in a statement. “Some are readers whose main interest is breaking news and things to do, while others want access to the entirety of The Boston Globe. These two distinct sites will allow us to serve both types of readers with maximum effectiveness, while continuing to provide advertisers the large engaged audience they have come to expect from Boston.com,” he declared.
The strategy jumps on two emerging trends in the news industry. The first is a growing propensity among traditional print news organizations to charge readers for full access to content. A number of newspapers have placed or plan to place some or all of their content behind paywalls, including The Wall Street Journal, The London Times and The New York Times, the latter of which is owned by the same parent company as The Boston Globe.
Boston.com follows a different movement: The recent proliferation of free local news sites like ChicagoNow, owned by The Chicago Tribune and TBD.com, the content for which is sourced from other providers. These sites are filling in the void of local newspapers, more than 100 of which shut down in 2009 alone.
While the decision to split into two distinct properties may strike some as odd, it’s a wise move in a transitioning market. Faced with rising costs, falling print circulation and declining or flat advertising revenue, newspapers have been forced to explore new business models. Although digital advertising revenue is growing, the web offers nearly infinite ad space, and newspapers simply cannot command the same rates for online display ads as they could once charge for print.
The Boston Globe currently attracts about 5 million unique readers per month, making it the eighth largest newspaper website in the U.S.
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