In case you missed it earlier this week, Raymond Snoddy reports from Tuesday’s MediaTel conference, taking a closer look at the Times paywall figures and finding no stone left unturned in the hunt for ‘digital sales’:
The News International press release announcing “105,000 digital sales for The Times and The Sunday Times” was a masterpiece of the spinners art – precise on the best possible gloss on the highest possible feasible headline numbers, more vague on what they mean.
While it’s not a totally catastrophic start the closer you look at the Times’ numbers the less impressive they appear
Clearly they threw in the kitchen sink to get past the magic 100,000 transaction mark. The figure includes single one-day purchases, the Kindle and iPad applications. The monthly subscriptions, a better guide to sustainable, continuing business amount to “around half” of the 105,000 total.