Daily Telegraph WAP Site Set Free, But Is It Too Late?

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The Daily Telegraph has decided to switch up their mobile content site from a subscription service, at the same time as the main site receives a major facelift.

The new Telegaph mobile site is still tailored specifically towards access from phones and PDAs, with streamlined navigation and ease of access to lead stories. The snazzy new desktop edition has donated some of the assets to the mini-offshoot and admittedly looks very impressive, see here!

The site used to charge a £5 monthly subscription fee, despite waiving this fee surfers will still be coughing up the usual data transfer rates…

So why no ticker tape parade? This news has generated an industry wide yawn of apathy, supposedly as everyone else knew it was never a viable proposition to charge for such content. To ask for a monthly fee whlst the online presence of almost all broadsheet or tabloid competitors was free, a fairly naive decision to say the least.

The digital arm of a newspaper no longer serves to regurgitate the outpourings of the ink-based original, it rather serves as an immediate and personal facet of the medium, offering columns and blogs from specific journalists, video and editorial content with far more depth and breadth than ever.

The problem is that the web is largely a free domain, the odd few find themselves in the fortunate situation to be able to charge for content, but the majority have to recoup through advertising and other means. The fact that newspapers can engage on the go is the last line of defence keeping the presses rolling. As soon as a Kindle-esque device can beam an online edition of the papers the second they are released will be the death knell of the traditional print medium.

Specialist magazines have been the first to fall, how can they hope to compete with month-old news when the web equivalents complete with sloppy copy and over-opinionated writers can beat them to the punch? Gaming, music and sports magazine dwindling readerships can attest to that fact. Exclusive content and gimmicky freebies can only get one so far…

As long as they continue to provide original web content, accept that the losses from a robust website are a necessary evil to retain brand visibility and remain free to peruse, then the Telegraph will remain abreast in a very challenging market.

Congratulations for making the mobile site free, welcome to the 21st Century.

Tags: daily telegraph, mobile