Wallets at the ready!
It looks like The Telegraph newspaper will follow in the footsteps of The Times and erect a pay wall around its website in the new year.
The Telegraph's parent company TMG is rumoured to have been working on a way to get more money and mulling charging for its online content for some time, a plan that will probably come to fruition in 2011, The Independent reported.
A spokeswoman for TMG told the newspaper: "Absolutely no decisions have been made on the introduction of a paid-content model. Like all publishers, TMG continually evaluates the developments in the digital sector."
However, insiders have reportedly told The Independent that plans have been afoot ‘for some time' but the pay model for The Telegraph is likely to differ from The Times, which charges for absolutely all its online content.
It is understood that The Telegraph will pursue a strategy of ‘controlled consumption' and keep a handful of articles free to access for non-subscribers, hoping they will realise how wonderful the online publication is and rush to hand over their money.
Dan Cryan, an analyst from Screen Digest told The Independent: "Newspaper companies are faced with declining traditional circulation and the online advertising just isn't making up the difference. It is leading publishers to examine a series of other models, most notably paywalls."
In a week that has seen Richard Branson dip his toes into the magazine world for the iPad with Project, while Rupert Murdoch as announced the launch of his iPad ‘newspaper', The Daily and The Independent is plugging its i app, it is clear the media is fighting hard to evolve and stay alive.
It is only a matter of months since Murdoch made the brave move to erect a paywall around The Times and The Sunday Times news websites and The News of The World got one last month with Murdoch announcing that The Sun is heading the same way.
Since introducing the pay walls to The Times websites in June, some 105,000 online sales have been notched up but many readers who used the free site have sought out different free news sites.
Rebekah Wade, chief exec of Murdoch-owned News International reportedly said the figures showed that "large numbers of people are willing to pay for quality journalism in digital formats".
Meanwhile, charging for access to the FT website has reportedly paid off as website and iPad subscriptions have risen by 50 percent to 180,000 in the first 9 months of 2010, which Cryan reportedly believes is down to its niche content.
"Readers are willing to pay for information they can't get anywhere else," he added.
