Brazilian newspaper wants to eliminate its print edition

Posted by Clara Martínez Turco on July 6, 2010 at 12:41 PM

The Jornal do Brasil, which in 1995 became the first Brazilian newspaper to launch an online edition, is studying whether it should stop publishing its print edition and offer only an Internet version, the Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas revealed.

In a half-page ad published in its June 30 edition and under the title "Your opinion for the future," the newspaper invited readers to participate on an online survey regarding the publishing change. According to the announcement, the goal of the national daily is "to reinforce and prioritize its digital platform."

However, the newspaper O Estado de S. Paulo reported that the interruption of the circulation is an attempt to solve the daily's financial problems as its liabilities have reached the $451 million dollars mark, mostly due to labour and tax debts.

Although the results of the research will not be published until August, the columnist of the Jornal du Brasil Guilherme Barros said the change would take place. "The tendency is to become the first traditional newspaper in the country to become only electronic," Guilherme said, El Mundo quoted.

Nonetheless, the company's president, Pedro Grossi, told O Estado de S. Paulo that he had doubts about the viability of eliminating the print edition of a newspaper that next year is turning 120 years old.

"Paper will not stop being used. I saw a document that indicates that circulation increased by 35 percent in emerging countries," Grossi said while pointing out that the change will be ultimately determined by the newspaper's principal investor and readers' willingness to pay for online content.