On Tue, 30 Jan 1996, John B. VanZwieten wrote:

> A much larger portion of NYT advertising is national advertisers (40%)than 
> for the rest of all daily metros(10%).  NYT charges $360 a year because they 
> can. 

I don't get the "national" edition -- I used to when I lived in Ann 
Arbor.  In Washington, we get pretty much, a 4 section paper that is very 
similar to the NYC edition.  On Sundays, we don't get the real estate 
or the employment classified sections.

And most of the ads are for Lord & Taylor and Macys (granted we have 
those stores here), A&S, movies (which obviously are available here, but 
at different theaters), and computers and audio components and the like.  
It still seems pretty local in intent, regardless of how it is categorized.
 
> They have no obligations but they would be foolish to ignore that 
> audience because it is potentially much larger than the metro area NYT 
> serves.  The NYT is a world newspaper which just hasn't been able to 
> reach its audience with its paper product very well.  Now they can do a 
> better job of global coverage if they so choose.

I am not making myself clear on what I meant wrt international or even 
non-metro subscribers.  Partly this is because I wrote some thoughts 
about this last April or May and didn't want to be repetitive.  

Wrt "obligation" I meant people shouldn't feel that the NYT or any other
digital paper ought to be made available for free, because they don't have
to print and distribute, and ordinarily wouldn't reach that market
geographically.  I myself read the Financial Times, the Economist, and New
Scientist, all from England.  The first two are printed in the U.S., and
don't seem to have much in the way of U.S.-specific advertising.  The
Econmist btw, has more subscribers in the U.S. than in England, so perhaps
it is a model for reaching out-of-(normal)market readers. 

As I wrote last year, a paper in Mexico City or in Toyko could 
develop a whole set of advertisers for a digital edition that were 
relevant to out-of-market readers -- say travel, banking, 
telecommunications, etc. depending on the relevant demographics.  As the 
economy truly becomes global, digital versions of normally print products 
can reach whole new markets.

Rather than target ads by domain, which seems too unspecific for me, is it
possible to key this in to specific ids and passwords, comparable in a way
to RR Donnelley's "Selectronic"  printing system for magazines? 

I also wrote and have written subsequently, that papers like the
Washington Post or LA Times or Des Moines Register or SJ Mercury News
could develop online products more akin to magazines wrt to federal
government, entertainment industry, agriculture or computing respectively,
based on the fact those industries are centered in their home markets,
in a manner comparable to how the NYT has created cybertimes as a 
unique aspect of their online product.   

Richard Layman
rllayman@netcom.com

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End of online-news-digest V1 #496
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