UK current affairs weekly The Spectator starts charging online

Posted by Emma Heald on September 17, 2009 at 3:02 PM

UK current affairs weekly the Spectator is to start charging online for content that is in the print magazine. Website-only content, such as the site's Coffee House blog, will remain free, Press Gazette and others reported.

The Spectator is currently offering an annual subscription to the digital editions of the magazine online for £67.50, exactly half the price of a print subscription at £135. UK readers can subscribe to the print edition at a special rate of 12 weeks for £12: both print subscriptions include online access. The Spectator also offers its US readers a Kindle subscription for $4.99 a month. Like the Economist, it allows one-off delivery orders.

Press Gazette quoted Spectator chairman and editor-in-chief Andrew Neil, who said in a press release that "the idea of a magazine or newspaper giving away its content for free over the internet was never particularly logical, but the industry was feeling its way in a new market. The Spectator has now agreed a clear business model, online and offline."

"Our website is profitable within its own right, through advertisers and sponsors, and its bespoke online content will remain free. But the magazine is a distinct entity and has to be paid for; we are asking those who want to read its superb content to pay for it and we have come up with a variety of ways in which they can do so."

The print circulation of the magazine dropped 2.4% in the first half of this year; presumably the move to charge online is an attempt to protect the print product while increasing online revenue. It was recently reported that fellow weekly news magazine the Economist was considering putting its online content behind a paywall. It is also a strategy that numerous newspaper publishers in the US and UK seem to be contemplating.

Source: Press Gazette, Journalism.co.uk