Future role of indymedia

national | miscellaneous | news report Thursday March 28, 2002 15:50 by publo

Ireland.com will charge users somewhere "in line with" €70 a year to access the Irish Times online, according to chief operating officer Mary Mangan. She said $100 (€113) a year would be "a bit steep".

This is interesting cos when people can't get the news on the establishment newssites without paying for it, then they will turn elsewhere for the info.It could mean that sites like indymedia will have a much wider participatory audience which would be interesting, but what will its effects be on information discrimination, if those who can afford it get one thing while those who cant will not.

The Times it is a-chargin'

By Adrian Weckler
Dublin, Ireland, 24 March, 2002

The fee will not include access to Ireland.com e-mail, which currently costs $30 (€34) a month. Other services, such as Ireland. com's archive search and breaking news facility, will also no longer be free.

Since going online in 1994, Ireland.com has been free, despite investing millions in additional parts of the site such as recruitment and property.

The division employs 50 people, which is far more than any other content website with the exception of RTE. But because it has been relying on advertising revenue only, it has lost a lot of money in that time and has never looked like being profitable in its own right.

Once it came under the control of Mary Mangan, change was inevitable. Mangan is a tough-talking, no-nonsense businesswoman whose previous jobs included steering Ireland Online into acquisition by Esat. Mangan believes that information is a product and is for sale. If you don't want to read it, you don't have to pay. And Mangan is not alone in her thinking.

In the past fortnight, the London Times and the Financial Times announced that they will replace free access with subscription services. These will cost up to stg£100 (€161) a year, according to the respective sites.

CNN also announced last week that it would charge $5 a month for news video clips which had been free until now. Yahoo! said it would charge $30 (€34) a year for previously free e-mail services.

The Irish News already charges $100 (€113) a year for online access while the Wall Street Journal charges $59 (€67) a year. This is the service that Mangan says Ireland.com will adhere to, cost-wise.

But will people pay? Ireland.com began charging for its free e-mail service last year. Though the paper will not say what the fall-off in account holders was, industry sources estimated that at least 80 to 90 per cent of users deserted the service.

If there is a similar fall-off in visitor numbers to the site, how would that affect site advertising?

Mangan said advertisers were not worried because visitors who are willing to pay are more valuable than freebie surfers.

Ireland.com receives 1.5 million `unique visitors' (individual users) a month, most of them from the United States.

The company is gambling that this demographic will be decisive. After all, Irish web users can simply buy a newspaper. But will people in the US pay for previously free services?

A recent report from internet research company Jupiter Media Matrix said that 70 per cent of adults already online "could not understand why anyone would pay for content". Jupiter also predicted that the worldwide market for paid content services would be worth just $5.8 billion (€6.57 billion) by 2006.

Mangan said her analysis of Ireland. com's database showed its visitors were "loyal". However, in the short term, the websites of other newspapers including The Sunday Business Post could benefit from Ireland. com's decision.