Globe and Mail starts charging for online news
Canada's national daily, The Globe and Mail, on Monday began charging readers a Can$20 monthly subscription to access news on its website.
The Toronto-based newspaper's print edition on Monday was wrapped in an advertisement for the new online service, which can be accessed from a laptop or tablet computer, or a mobile phone.
Publisher Phillip Crawley had announced the move establishing a so-called paywall in May, saying it needed to boost revenues amid sliding advertising sales as readers turn more and more to the Internet for news, shunning print media.
Non-subscribers, however, will still be granted limited access to news on the website for free—a maximum of 10 articles per month.
The Globe and Mail's erecting of a paywall follows that of The New York Times Co., which began charging in March 2011 for full access to NYTimes.com, in a move that the company said last April was beginning to pay off.
Crawley said The Globe and Mail has "learned from their experience," which has seen the Times reduce its number of free articles per month to 10 from the original 20.
Other newspapers have been using paywalls with varying degrees of success.
The New York Times Co. last October also launched a subscription-only website for the Boston Globe, which it owns.
(c) 2012 AFP
