Ireland.com -- <10k subscribers
Interesting to hear Geraldine Kennedy on Marian Finucane at the weekend. She was asked how many subscribers Ireland.com had and replied that it was "between eight and ten thousand". She also said that the site struggles to break even. Not a very hopeful sign for Ireland's true web economy.
10k subscribers isn't bad for a subscription-only site of that size.
I doubt the lack of subscribers reflects anything about Ireland's web economy -- it's just not very good value for money, in my opinion, given the quality of the output compared to the UK papers (which can be read for free).
By the way, I still believe they could make more money with open access and advertising, as the Guardian did. Their director of digital content noted in 2006 that the open-access site 'will break even for the first time this financial year, largely on pursuing a model of advertising revenue', and the New York Times also decided to discard their pay-wall for the same reason.
Posted by: Justin Mason | March 11, 2008 at 11:11 AM
I'd agree with Justin
The only time I use Ireland.com is if I need access to an article that I really need.
There are plenty of other news sources available that are free and high quality.
It's no reflection on the web economy, be that Irish or international
Posted by: | March 13, 2008 at 09:16 PM