The online editions of the leading Nigerian newspapers like The Guardian and Daily Sun are lagging behind.

Imagine that they couldn't even post the breaking news on the execution of Saddam Hussein yesterday?

Are they up to the task or just online for nothing more than just the fact of claiming to be online?

The foreign newspapers reported the pipeline explosions in Nigeria online before even the NTA, AIT and Nigerian newspapers online.

I reported the news even before them and Nairaland has been updating the news with live discussions 24/7. But our so called largest circulating newspapers are behind us.

What is wrong with them?

I agree with you on that. I dont really know whats wrong with them but I can tell you that they are doing a piss-poor job of having an online presence if you cant get the job done.
I spend a lot of time online and of course it will be worth my time getting my news while on the net but what do you have? Half baked news web sites! Some websites put up their breaking news at a particular time of the day irrespective of when it happened!
I think some of the reasons they have might be

*They don't think Nigerians have that much access to the internet
*Their webmasters are not the best/not good enuff
*Just plain lazy!

Its not just the papers - the TV stations are probably worse & the radio stations are barely faring better.

They need to step up!

I have seen when CNN used the Camera men from the Nigerian Televsion Authority (NTA) to record and report breaking news in Nigeria before the NTA could even do so. Because, the NTA camera man and reporter were still on their way back to their TV station and the producer/director of news must also preview and edit the tapes and then the Executive Director of news must approve it and the whole process would take hours.

The Nigerian newspapers are just lazy and backward.

In my opinion (not worth much ) I think it has to do with motivation and who maintains the website.

Motivation: is there a dedicated I(C)T department and if so who runs it and how much is this person getting paid? Are such pple on-call 24 hours? Are they able to either upload news from their homes and/or get to work safely when the news breaks?

Who maintains the site? Once the initial site goes up, does the newspaper company pay a 3rd party to maintain the site? do they maintain the site themselves (refer to "motivation" abv)?

Just my 2 cents

The problem with most TV channels, radio stations and newspapers are that they are commercial ventures.

They do not really care about the legitimacy of their editorial and they definitely do not want to make waves or create enemies, especially with political parties. They are there for one purpose only,

TO MAKE MONEY

So do not judge them too harshly and do not expect a high standard of independent journalism either

Reverend,

I personally think, and I could be wrong , that there is a difference b/w offending a political party and providing readers with the most up-to-date information, some of which in the end may even end up promoting such political bias.

Moved to politics section.

It's really embarrassing reading the news reports online. I often end up confused with their very shallow articles. Very little tangible information and a non existent investigative journalism.