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Times expands AOL deal
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February 20, 1997: 6:51 a.m. ET
The New York Times to make more content available on America Online
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NEW YORK (CNNfn) -- One of the debates occurring among Internet content providers is whether the Web or a proprietary service like America Online is the best bet.
Since it's unlikely that debate will be settled anytime soon, The New York Times is playing it safe and going both routes.
On Tuesday, the company announced it is expanding its alliance with AOL and plans to put more content on the nation's No. 1 online service.
Martin Niszenholtz of New York Times new media, said the paper hopes the increased content will bring more advertisers to its AOL site.
America Online is making the Times its premier newspaper which means it will step up promotion of the paper's offerings, some of which will be exclusive to AOL.
Niszenholtz said the deal reflects the fact that the nature of doing business online is constantly changing.
"The business model is changing for information providers on AOL from one that used to be based on hourly fees to one that is based on being able to reach large numbers of people and getting advertisers to sponsor these services," he said.
He said both the Times' site on AOL and the Web site get about the same number of visitors, although the usage patterns are different.
Like most newspapers, Niszenholtz said the Times' Web site does not compete with its print counterpart. That means exclusive stories aren't put on the Web before they appear in print.
Peak time for the AOL site is during prime time and on the weekends whereas more people visit the Web site during the day.
Currently, access to the Web site is free to U.S. residents while international readers are charged the normal home delivery rate.
Appearing on CNNfn's Digital Jam, Niszenholtz said the newspaper has no immediate plans to follow the lead of The Wall Street Journal and start charging everyone for access.
"We're very satisfied with where we are in terms of advertising revenue. There are 1,700 newspapers on the Web and The Wall Street Journal is the only one charging.
"We're ahead of plan in terms of advertising revenue and ahead of projections in terms of usage," he said.
Last week, the newspaper trade journal Editor & Publisher sponsored a conference for interactive newspapers to help newspapers decide whether or not to go online and how to design an effective online presence.
Niszenholtz said the general viewpoint of conference speakers was newspapers large and small have a lot to gain from going to the Web. (213K WAV) or (213K AIFF)
Right now, he said the main challenge for smaller newspapers going on the Web is to get advertisers on board.
"Newspapers serve local communities. It's challenging for them to develop revenue because advertisers in those markets don't have much money to spend.
"It will come. It's just a matter of understanding the critical nature in all of this."
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