mambe:
IMHO, what ruppert is doing actually makes sense, depending on how you look at it.  Bear in mind that he doesn't want to "sell" the content of all his online news, just financial.  Now, there are only few sources as good as Wall Street Journal, if at all, and so I am sure, though I could be wrong, that there are those who wouldn't mind paying a premium for that information.  In other words, if he were trying to "sell" regular news, that wouldn't work.

Coming to think of it, where all else fails, why doesn't Ruppert just replace his regular ads with google adsense ads?  Worse case, he will make money from the ad impressions

legba:
The good thing about the net is that unlike regular software, you can update the web literally every second. I have been blessed to work with companies with very busy sites. These companies monitor site traffic like crazy. Even a 5% drop triggers red flags all over the place and meetings would have been held within 3 days of such a drop. Before you know it, a decision, no matter how long it took to implement or how expensive is yanked, just to get the traffic back to normal. Why? because a drop in traffic is a drop in ad revenue (advertisers always demand to see the logs for themselves).

There was no excuse for what punch did. Worse case, they should have set up a beta site for it and done such risky (IMHO) experiments there. Heck, google is pretty much code proof yet every single thing they put out at first is deemed beta so who is punch?

@Yawa
what is bad is not what Ruppert is doing, but the way he is doing it. insulting King of Web while taking that step. in other words. the best way fight is not to challenge the president because you will be dead in no time
Most people dont have the habbit of paying for news, but they could, though its risky.
Some can do it like you said the financial content seekers but are you sure google will not get sources with about 80% equal content and then present it for free ??
at the end of the day they will loose credibility amongst Google fans and also loose web traffic to their site, but like I read they dont care about the latter. but Mine you Google doesnt make money from news search and its not like news search is google.com its just an experiment. why fight with the king and spoil your name over one of its experiments

Well as they say, time will tell.

Again, bear in mind that very few, if at all, can match the reputation of wall street journal. Again, time will tell.

For the record, though I don't necessarily agree with the move, I can assure you, though I don't have the facts to back it up that, unlike Punch, ruppert has done some proper feasibility studies and may have even gone as far as making whoever will be hosting the news sign a contract of secrecy until the deal is sealed (or not).

Regardless, make no mistake about it - others will be watching and ruppert might as well be setting a precedent, a bad one, but a precedent nonetheless.

Again, time will tell.

i guess the guys at punch decided to wake up, how can you make a decision like that when you have more than enuf competetors
what a bad way to get punched

The site used to be my daily tonic until it became commecialized. I have since deleted it from my memory. infact it makes the hardcopy disgusting to me and I have stop reading it. They are typical extortionists and capitalism who always think of making money out of anything and/or anybody. To hell with the paper.

bros, take it easy. in business there are no permanent enemies. just permanent interests.

I thought that was in politics. Hmm.

not only in politics, friend. even in business.

Someone must have made money from it, one consultant somewhere would have sold them the model !! and they fell for it hook, line and sinker - i nearly peed my pant when i saw that they were trying to charge for stale NEWS !! Newspapers sell yesterday's news which we go don hear for ITV or Silverbird etc - bunch of clowns, i no dey even go there again, free or not ,

@ poster, thanks 4 ur info.

you can not win them all, you win some you lose some

Take a look at these bookmarked news websites on my phone. If I read news on all these websites F.O.C, why should I pay to read the news on punch website?  

Silly people! They just shot themselves on the feet.

More bookmarked News websites. Take note of the other Nigerian daily newspapers which are direct competitors to Punch.

^^ ? ?

Something must have been really wrong with those guys. There are other sites equally as good and even better that report the same news they do and it's F.O.C to read the news on these other websites.

very interesting indeed!

punch, bunch!

well i told the webmaster that it will eventually backfire. looks like i am a prophet.

you certainly are.

Good for them! I knew that "business model" was bound to fail! I don't even have time for them again!

yawa-ti-de:

I have been blessed to work with companies with very busy sites.  These companies monitor site traffic like crazy.  Even a 5% drop triggers red flags all over the place and meetings would have been held within 3 days of such a drop.  Before you know it, a decision, no matter how long it took to implement or how expensive is yanked, just to get the traffic back to normal.  Why? because a drop in traffic is a drop in ad revenue (advertisers always demand to see the logs for themselves).

Seun can probably use similar traffic trend/logs to generate revenue. He can meet with the marketing directors in telecoms or bank industry-explain the works-and why they should advertise on his site.

He would have to show what percentage of site visitors visit the bank/telecom post section, what they are looking for, how they came about the site, post topics, and how all these relates to users eventually going to the banks site, are these users looking for info? or just posting regular stuff, - the likes- should have a strong case to show the site will lead to back to their site blah blah blah

the guys are wiser now.

@ poster, that's beta now. Who want pay for news wey dey free for other sites?

Big lessons learnt here. I also don't think online news would be paid for in the future by anyone. It's funny though: if you can or have to pay for news prints, why can't there be an online model (that'll work)?

there are online newspapers you still have to pay to read.

Are they making money? How much money?

i think they are. these are foreign newsprints by the way.

hm,  this is an interesting post, it is even more interesting with Yawa leading the argument of a wrong doing by punch.

As against yawa's argument, I will like to see this from another angle, Yes punch tried out a business model which a lot of people including me didnt see working/succeeding in the Nigeria enviroment but there is no error in trying anything in this world anyway, business itself is risk and in steping out to implement anything you take risk either good or bad the worst thing that can happen is that you fail and try again.

As in the case of punch, credibly feasibility studies was carried out by professionals, I was a bit fortunate to review a document by the a team from LBS but the truth is punch was ahead of time (2 years from reports) and everybody knows that.

There is nothing wrong with punch did but in the Nigeria environment its a big deal, you may want to read this post on google's plan for paid news also:

http://blogswork./2009/09/10/google-plans-paid-news-platform/

When this was first implemented, I seek to know the reason behind this and the argument was: punch business is sustain mainly by the print edition of the publication and with the introduction of the mobile edition and e-paper (page by page version of the print edition online called e-paper _{first from punch in Nigeria and in testing the market it has been free for over 2 years}) of punch newspaper, the print edition stand the rick of losing purchasing power since you can now read the stories in your cars, molue and anywhere on your mobile phone, the mobile edition will sure contest with the print if it is free, so its best to restrict access and balance the circulation of the paper with the mobile content less the print edition falls short in sales while the online remains free.

However after implementing this, some argue, why should I pay for the mobile and e-paper but the web which have the same content remains free, again another valid argument from business point of view and as such the web version was placed behind a pay wall.

Now the question in my head is this, where did punch get it wrong? there is nothing wrong with restricting your content, that is a no issue, it is punch's content and before the website it wasn't free, the print is not free so if they decide to make the web paid service also, i see nothing wrong in this in the business sense, but what went wrong?

Some factors I think was against them includes:

1. Nigeria's environment
2. The cost of subscription, in my sense of thinking its too expensive, I will rather buy the print where i will see advert and gain concept on graphic.
3. Wrong Timing

The decision to make it free was made I believe after the management reviewed the success or failure of the business model, did it work did it not work, the public may never know but I am happy punch is free again.

I wonder oooooo! The decision has to be reversed considering growing rate of online news in Nigeria. Or what do you guys think?

i agree. timing is everything in business.