Quote:
Originally Posted by GeoffC
now if they'd taken the idea to the next step and provided an iPad (for instance) included in the subscription - then I might be tempted, even if that price was slightly higher ... it would, at least, get rid of the annoying articles that are important to be started on page 1 and then continue on page 5! - although the digital versions will probably have their own quirks....
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These are clearly just their first steps into the pay market with their newspapers, given that the ipad still doesn't have a confirmed release date in europe while they may offer read anywhere deals later, it does seem sensible for them to get this first stage out of the way first or maybe they will update their options before the launch. There are plenty of options they could add in the future e.g. maybe they have a number of people that only ever read the one columnist, rather than losing those readers they could sell a reduced subscription that only covered that bit of the paper or you could have bigger subs that covered all the murdoch papers.
As far as the overall idea, it does seem like it will be tougher for them than some like the wsj that has a more specialised content and audience because a large amount of people will just go elsewhere, but as long as they are no worse off financially I don't think they will worry at first and if the change improves things for them then the other equally struggling newspapers will probably follow suit, which would in turn make things better for them.
As far as reputation, that has nothing to do with total audience, the most popular papers in the uk are the tabloids and they are all a load of crap.