Add US News & World Report and the Christian Science Monitor to the list of publications that are dropping their print editions and going online only.
According to this report from the Washington Post, US News will continue to publish a print once a month, but the issues will be consumer guides, like its popular annual college and hospital rankings. According to the Post, US News has long been a distant third in the newsweekly category, behind Time and Newsweek, and has seen several rounds of layoffs in the past few years. On the other hand, the US News Website is attracting about 7 million visitors a month, and officials are optimistic about the magazine’s digital transformation. “For all of you who have worked so hard to make this transition possible, say good-bye to Web 2.0 and welcome to Journalism 5.0,” US News President Bill Holiber and editor Brian Kelly wrote in a memo to staff, according to the Post.
The Christian Science Monitor published this announcement last week that beginning in April 2009, it will become the first national newspaper to publish a daily paper online only. Plans call for CSM to continuously update its Website, CSMonitor.com, throughout the day as well as publish a daily email edition and a weekly print edition. According to the Monitor, the paper – which turns 100 on Nov. 25 – has been losing readers for 40 years, but readership of its Website has grown to 1.5 million visitors a month.
While a lot of writers I know are mourning the loss of the CSM as they know it, I feel quite the opposite. If the news business is going digital – and it is – publications like US News and CSM that are first to make the change will have that much more time to figure out a sustainable financial model.
The move to an all-digital format has other implications for writers, including freelance writers. It makes learning how to incorporate multimedia into stories that much more critical. And if the first publications to go all-digital are going to be big winners, so will the freelancers who are able to keep up with them.