Latest News

As a part of the Tribune Co.'s efforts to reduce costs and direct resources to focus on local coverage, the Daily Press of Newport News, Virginia will outsource page design, formatting and editing pages to the company's flagship paper, the Chicago Tribune. This announcement came to the staff at both the newspapers on Monday, the Tribune reported.

The transfer of responsibilities from the Daily Press suggests elimination of copy editors and designers, Hampton Roads reported. The newsroom staff will likely be reduced by 15 percent, Digby Solomon, president and chief executive of the Daily Press, told the Tribune.

Belgium's La Derniere Heure released an edition Tuesday in which all photos and advertisements are in 3D, and readers are given cardboard 3D glasses with every copy, ABC News reported today. Text is not three-dimensional.

It took two months to create the 3D edition, which had a print run of 115,000, higher than usual. Editor Hubert Leclercq told ABC News that the paper was following the trend of the recent rise in popularity of 3D films, television and video games.

Sun-Times Media Holdings LLC is planning to invest more than US$5 million in technology upgrades for print and online content, as well as back-office upgrades, Crain's Chicago Business reported yesterday.

A new centralised editing system could mean some employees will lose their job, CEO Jeremy Halbreich told Crain's. The project is expected to be finished at the end of the year, he said.

Aggregators such a Google are often accused of making life more than a little difficult for newspapers - yet the company has spoken out once again, offering advice for newspapers struggling against the ubiquity of online news:

In an article by Mercedes Bunz from The Guardian's Digital Content Blog, Google stated that the "key" to newspaper's survival online is "engagement". The statement, issued by Google's Hal Varian, places emphasis on the importance of offering readers interactive experiences but provided little information on specific steps publications should take to go about doing this.

For more on this story, visit our sister publication, editorsweblog.org.

Online media revenue in the Middle East and North Africa is expected to spike to US$600 million by 2015, from less than $100 million last year, research from global consulting firm Booz and Company shows, The National reported today. Mobile revenues are also increasing, expected to reach $2.7 billion.

According to the report, 70 percent of audiences in MENA countries said they spend two hours or more on the Internet each day, while 36 percent said they spend two or more hours watching TV.

Newspapers must find new revenue streams outside advertising in order to survive, the CEO of Publicis told the inaugural Abud Dhabi media summit today, MediaGuardian reported.

"It is not and/or but and/and. We need to have advertising and paid content. Some part of the content could be open and others available on subscription or pay per view," said Maurice Lévy, head of the French advertising group, the third largest in the world by revenue.

Newsweek magazine is planning to launch an English-language edition in Pakistan in September, MediaBistro.com reported. Newsweek Pakistan will be the first licensed international news magazine for the country and the eighth local edition under the Washington Post Co.-owned Newsweek brand.

Pakistan has a population of 180 million and only about 100,000 copies of English-language publications sold in a day. Newsweek's Pakistan edition will offer both local and international content, and is expected to start off with a print run of 30,000 copies, according to the Financial Times.

HT Media Ltd., publisher of Hindustan Times in India, peaked in almost two years in Mumbai trading as its unit planned to raise 3 billion rupees ($66 million) through an initial public offer, Bloomberg reported.

 Hindustan Media Ventures Ltd., a subsidiary of HT Media, filed a draft red herring prospectus (DRHP) on Friday with the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) on March 5, according to Indian Television.

The latest addition to paid online content in the United Kingdom comes from Newsquest Media Group. Two northwest dailies of the group, The Bolton News and Lancashire Telegraph, launched subscription-only electronic editions of their titles last week, HoldtheFrontPage.co.uk reported.

While the print editions of the newspapers are sold at 40p per copy, the online editions are available at a fraction of the cost, 10p per copy; thereby allowing readers a chance to save money and get news on time. The e-editions use "page-turning" software by PageSuite, used by many local newspapers.