Standard-Times website becomes paid

Rupert Murdoch said his newspapers would charge and our S.E. Mass daily is first
$3.37 a week, or 50 cents a day - Can The Cape Cod Times be far behind?

The Standard-Times in Southeast Massachusetts is the sister newspaper of the Cape Cod Times, and overseen by the Cape Cod Times Publisher Peter Meyer.

The Standard-Times announced in January that it will no longer offer its content free online.

On January 12, 2010, the Standard-Times started charging $3.37 a week, or about 50 cents a day, to access what has been free since this award-winning news site pioneered online content a dozen years ago.

Murdoch warned us

Last Spring as the newspaper industry's revenues were in free fall, ending the year with a 26% loss over 2008, Rupert Murdoch, who owns the parent company of both the Cape Cod Times and the Standard-Times, said that he would soon charge for the content on all of his media products which include Fox TV and Fox News.

This April it got much worse with newspaper circulation in free fall, Globe dropping 23%, Cape Cod Times -8.4%, Worcester Telegram -9.4%, USA Today -13.6%.

The statement on their website read:

We're making some changes to our online news and information options that will change how you access these products. Beginning January 12, 2010, SouthCoastToday.com will become a subscription site.

The newspaper industry future is grim

The newspaper industry is predicted to lose another 26% of its revenue in 2010, but it can never make up those losses by charging for online content. Internet gurus say that its a decade too late to stop the free flow of news and information.

Tens of thousands of newspaper men and women have been laid off in the past decade, and thousands of them are now writing blogs online with free news and opinion.

In addition the nation's television stations, which were always free, are beefing up their online content which will remain also free to consumers.

New online newssites like this one are opening up all over the country, often owned and operated by local journalists who were laid off by that area's newspapers.

Age and ire may have finally caught up with Rupert Murdoch, arguably the most successful newspaperman of his generation.

Will you pay for online content?

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