Russia's Daily Online may venture into video only

Posted by Alisa Zykova on December 23, 2009 at 1:55 PM

Russian-language online business news portal Daily Online might chuck the articles and instead focus on video content, Lenta.ru reported today. The outlet's budget was set to expire in December 2009 and talks between investors might go on until the end of January, at which point it would be more clear as to whether Daily Online would be shut down or transformed into a web-TV station, Infox reported yesterday.

Web TV as news seems like a good opportunity, including the advertising sphere, according to Chief Editor Raf Shakirov. Online advertisers expect an increase in video advertising in 2010, Infox wrote. However, industry members do not have a positive outlook on Daily Online's future.

Vedomosti.ru Chief Victor Sakson told Infox the outlet did not have any "noticeable achievements" in its content and that it does not cater to Internet users. He went on to say it never featured a professional manager. Furthermore, "nothing can save it now," especially not video as it is more expensive than text.

Rb.ru founder Nataliya Moiseenkova said the current design and level of navigational comfort were not able to attract a considerable audience, even though the content itself was of higher quality, Infox reported. She added that video is already used by a lot of popular news providers and venturing into it may not benefit its core audience, which accesses the news from their workplace where Internet connections may not be suitable to adapt to videos.

Daily Online was officially launched on November 6, 2008. Its chief editor, Raf Shakirov, previously worked as chief editor for newspapers Kommersant, Gazeta and Izvestia as well as magazine The New Times.

News video content is currently available on Newstube.ru, which also features videos from TV channels like TV Centr, Euronews, Zvezda, Muz-TV, 7TV and others.