NewsBizBlog: 2013

Thursday, December 26, 2013

% of U.S. video displays seen in 10 venues

In the United States, millions of video displays are placed in various public places including restaurants, bars, grocery stores, doctor’s offices, hospitals, stores, gas stations, shopping centers, health clubs, airports, office buildings, and elevators, most of the times for marketing and promotional reasons, for sometimes for the distribution of news and information. According to Arbitron and Scarborough’s research released in February 2013, the highest proportion of viewers saw video displays in restaurants and bars (24 percent), followed by grocery stores (17 percent), doctor’s offices and hospitals (16 percent), retail stores (14 percent) and gas stations (13 percent). The 20-day reach, as measured by Arbitron and Scarborough, was almost 58 million for restaurants and bars, 29 million for grocery stories, and 28 million for doctor’s offices and hospitals.

The data set is a part of a collection of 500 revenue and usership trends in mobile, social, Internet, tablet, video and other digital categories, published in the 200-page Global Digital Media Trendbook 2013. GDMT, in its eight year, is to be published by World Newsmedia Network, a not-for-profit media research company, in September 2013. To subscribe to the PDF report and/or the tablet edition, go to www.wnmn.org, or contact mstone@wnmn.org.

U.S. newspaper newsroom workforce

Consequently, as the newspaper industry declines, so does its workforce. The U.S. newspaper newsroom workforce has declined from its high point of 56,400 in 2000 to 40,600 in 2011, according to Pew’s “State of the News Media” study in 2013.

Sixty percent of the American public has heard little or nothing about the financial woes of the newspaper industry’s newsroom cutbacks, including 36 percent who have heard nothing at all and 24 percent who have heard little, according to Pew’s “State of the News Media” study in 2013. Meanwhile, of those Americans who have stopped turning to a news outlet, 60.7 percent said the stories are less complete and 23.5 percent said there were fewer stories.

American newspapers have executed strategies to address the challenge of fewer journalists and therefore fewer stories produced. For some newspapers, such as the Chicago Tribune, a strategy with a tighter focus on investigative reporting and local reporting, and fewer stories that were commodities news was put in place. The Tribune also cut its ties with expensive news services, and uses its own Tribune “network” of content from the Los Angeles Times, Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel and Orlando Sentinel.

Newspaper advertising expenditure forecast for 2013

The top 25 daily newspaper digital editions are The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal far away from the rest of the pack, and both driven by daily “non-replica” editions, including mobile and PC Internet sites. The Times’ digital circulation is almost 900,000, while the Journal is at almost 800,000. The New York Post, Denver Post, Los Angeles Times, New York Daily News, Newark Star-Ledger and New York Newsday rounded out the top eight digital newspaper circulations, according to Alliance of Audited Media and Pew’s “State of the News Media” study in 2013.

The advertising expenditure forecast for newspapers in 2013 in some countries is dramatically lower than in 2012, according to WARC’s “International Ad Forecast 2013”. Australia is predicted to lose the most adspend, down 9.5 percent from 2012; followed by Italy, down8.4 percent; United States, down 8.3 percent; France, down 7.9 percent; China, down 7.6 percent; Canada, down 6 percent; and the United Kingdom, down 5.5 percent, according to WARC’s forecast. The unoptimistic forecast signals a readjustment since the economic crisis of 2008/09 and further evidence of the decline of print newspaper advertising in some countries, and a double digit growth of digital advertising.

Proportion of iPhone app revenue by most popular languages

U.S. unique tablets by platform

The number of tablets sold each month in the United States continues an upward trend, particularly in the Android category. comScore MobiLens conducted a three-month-average study in late 2012 and found that while Apple iOS tablet sales are increasing slightly, the Android market is driving the growth of more than 45,000 units per month. Tablets with other operating systems have been introduced but only control a tiny slice of the market, including HP, Windows and Blackberry.

U.S. mobile news access via browsers and apps

In some cases, gender played a role in the multitasking behavior, particularly when accessing sports scores: males were almost three times more likely to access scores while watching a TV program. Females were more likely to visit social networks either during the program or during the commercial.

However, the majority of news users still get their news via browsers, not apps, according to the Pew/Economist Group study. Sixty percent of news users get their news from a tablet browser, while 61 percent get theirs from a smartphone browser, while 23 percent get their news from a tablet app and 28 percent from a smartphone app. News users who say they get their news equally from browsers and apps range 16 percent for tablets and 11 percent for smartphone users.

The data set is a part of a collection of 500 revenue and usership trends in mobile, social, Internet, tablet, video and other digital categories, published in the 200-page Global Digital Media Trendbook 2013. GDMT, in its eight year, is to be published by World Newsmedia Network, a not-for-profit media research company, in September 2013. To subscribe to the PDF report and/or the tablet edition, go to www.wnmn.org, or contact mstone@wnmn.org.

16 to 24 group most prolific news video consumers

Even though the 16- to 24-year-old age group accesses any news content the least compared to their older counterparts, they are the most prolific users of video news, with 21 percent of the group accessing news content on video in the United Kingdom. Broken down by regularity of access, 23 percent of the younger respondents said they accessed video news content on most days, while 18 percent said two to three times per week and 12 percent said every day. The need for news organizations to develop more short-form and long-form news video is underscored by the fact that younger generations demand a more visual and video approach to news storytelling.

Top U.S. online video content properties

Video has captured the time and attention of American Internet users. comScore reports that Google sites like YouTube served more than 13 billion videos and snagged viewers for 388 minutes during December 2012. Other popular video websites included Facebook, VEVO, NDN, Yahoo!, AOL, Viacom, Microsoft, Amazon and Grab Media. The downloads and live streams produced hours of viewing time across the board, making video among the stickiest content available on content sites.

Wednesday, December 4, 2013

Traditional and Internet revenue

As with most countries of the world, television garners the most advertising in the media marketplace in the United States. In 2011, TV advertising fetched US$60 billion, and in 2016, it is expected to draw about $73 billion, according to Pew’s “State of the News Media”
study. Meanwhile, digital advertising surpassed newspaper advertising in 2010, has continued to rise from about $30 billion in 2011 and is predicted to grow to almost $58 billion by 2016. Newspapers are expected to see further decline, from about $20 billion in 2011 to about $16 billion in 2016.

The data set is a part of a collection of 500 revenue and usership trends in mobile, social, Internet, tablet, video and other digital categories, published in the 200-page Global Digital Media Trendbook 2013. GDMT, in its eight year, is to be published by World Newsmedia Network, a not-for-profit media research company, in September 2013. To subscribe to the PDF report and/or the tablet edition, go to www.wnmn.org, or contact mstone@wnmn.org.

Preliminary global PC vendor shipment estimates for 4Q12

The PC landscape continues to change rapidly. The U.S. PC maker HP continues its dominance in 2011 and 2012, but faces a host of competitors nipping at its heels, including China’s Lenovo, coming in a close second in number of shipments by the end of 2011 and 2012. Lenovo has seen spectacular growth of 8.2 percent between 2011 and 2012, and is expected to edge out HP for the top spot in 2013. American PC maker Dell has fallen on hard times and its sales have plunged almost 21 percent during that period. Meanwhile, Taiwan’s Acer Group is in the fourth spot, but has declined 11 percent during that period, while another Taiwanese maker, ASUS, has grown 6.4 percent and is on the ascendancy in the competitive PC landscape.

The data set is a part of a collection of 500 revenue and usership trends in mobile, social, Internet, tablet, video and other digital categories, published in the 200-page Global Digital Media Trendbook 2013. GDMT, in its eight year, is to be published by World Newsmedia Network, a not-for-profit media research company, in September 2013. To subscribe to the PDF report and/or the tablet edition, go to www.wnmn.org, or contact mstone@wnmn.org.

Monday, November 18, 2013

% change in U.S. newspaper circulation

Deutsche Bank tracks the change in American newspaper circulations in six-month intervals. Even before the economic crisis of 2008 hit, the circulations began their precipitous tumble, with the lowest year-over-year percentage drops for daily and Sunday circulations happening in 2009, according to Pew’s “State of the News Media” report in 2013.

Since 2009, the circulation declines continue, but at a slower rate. In 2012, Sunday circulations reached a growth stage, inching up 0.6 percent, while daily circulations have declined 0.2 percent, according to Deutsche Bank.

Digital paywalls’ impact in U.S.’ newspaper revenue

According to the “State of the News Media 2012” research by Nielsen, Pew and the NAA, about one third, or 450 U.S. newspapers have a paywall or are planning to construct one. About US$10 billion was made in 2011 on print and digital subscription revenue.

The United States’ largest newspaper chain, Gannett, makes one third of its revenue from circulation, and reports that they have 46,000 digital-only subscribers for their 80 newspapers. Meanwhile, 25 percent of the Lee Enterprises newspaper chain’s revenue comes from circulation, and they report a 4 percent circulation revenue increase from 2010 to 2011. The New York Times has 640,000 digital subscribers. Circulation has surpassed advertising revenues at The New York Times Company.

The New York Times reported in February 2013 that since they built their paywall in Quarter 2, 2011, the Times has seen a marked increase in quarter-over quarter revenues for circulation. Particularly of note is that during each quarter of 2012, circulation revenue growth has been in double digits, including a whopping 18.1 percent growth between Q3 and Q4 of 2012.

The Gannett Company reported in February 2013 that their net income per share increased 36 percent from Quarter 3 2011 to Quarter 3 2012, while the publishing segment dropped 3 percent. Gannett has seen a market increase of 22.8 percent for digital operating revenues company-wide, from US $320.6million to $334.6 million. Broadcast segments rose at a healthy clip of 38.1 percent for television revenues, from $168.8 million to $233 million during that time frame, and 36 percent for the broadcast operating segment, from $174.3 million to $237 million.

Eight percent of consumer magazines surveyed in North America charge for content on iPads, while half of newspapers and one-third of business publications do so, according to the Alliance for Audited Media’s Digital Publishing Survey in 2012. Meanwhile, the majority of consumer magazines also charge for content on Kindle (60 percent), Nook (56 percent) and iPhone (52 percent).

The data set is a part of a collection of 500 revenue and usership trends in mobile, social, Internet, tablet, video and other digital categories, published in the 200-page Global Digital Media Trendbook 2013. GDMT, in its eight year, is to be published by World Newsmedia Network, a not-for-profit media research company, in September 2013. To subscribe to the PDF report and/or the tablet edition, go to www.wnmn.org, or contact mstone@wnmn.org.

Thursday, November 14, 2013

Big Data: The four Vs

There are a variety of definitions for Big Data, including being a catch-all for the opportunities presented by the exponential growth of data in the media sector, including structured, internal data available through media companies’ own databases, as well as unstructured data on a multitude of digital channels, including video, audio, photos and reams of social media text.

“Little” data and Big Data have distinctly different characteristics. Little data, or those data whose capacity for storage is measured in gigabytes or smaller, and can be contained on a personal computer. Big Data is too big to fit on a personal computer, and can be stored on the cloud or other big storing system, as most Big Data would be measured in terabytes, petabytes, zettabytes or beyond.

To illustrate the point about the differences in storage requirements for big and little data, a 7-minute high-definition video requires one gigabyte of storage. However, one petabyte, which equals one million gigabytes, could store 13.3 years of continuously running high-definition videos. Google and its video website, YouTube, processes 24 petabytes of Big Data per day.

The data set is a part of a collection of 500 revenue and usership trends in mobile, social, Internet, tablet, video and other digital categories, published in the 200-page Global Digital Media Trendbook 2013. GDMT, in its eight year, is to be published by World Newsmedia Network, a not-for-profit media research company, in September 2013. To subscribe to the PDF report and/or the tablet edition, go to www.wnmn.org, or contact mstone@wnmn.org.

Improvements through investments

As media companies emerge from their economically induced cost-cutting modes, media executives say they are making a refreshing investment in their employees in 2013. Two out of the three top responses to media companies’ stated potential areas for improvement and development are commitments to training journalists and sales people. Journalist and sales person training have been a consistent priority for respondents of the four-year study.

Respondents rated developing journalist skills No. 1 for areas of improvement and development through investment, 60 percent; followed by convergence of multimedia operations, 52.5 percent; developing skills of sales people, 45.8 percent; paid-for digital content, 45.8 percent; invest in development of tablet products, 43.3 percent; encourage understanding and cooperation among departments, 41.7 percent; develop good working environment, 38.3 percent; upgrade content management systems, 37.5 percent; and marketing/ branding of news title, 35.8 percent.

Among the innovative training programs for journalists were the Global Editors Network Hack Days, a traveling training workshop to teach journalists the techniques of data journalism. Among the cities for the training in 2012 were Cairo, Delhi, New York, London, Paris, Berlin and Argentina. For more information, go to www.GlobalEditorsNetwork.org. An innovative sales training program, called “Street Fighting,” developed by local advertising sales trainer Mike Blinder, provides a cross-media sales technique of multimedia sales for media companies around the world. For more information, go to www.mikeblinder.com.

Tuesday, November 5, 2013

Multitasking and multimedia use

A growing number of people multitask with their media every day, according to a multitude of studies. Busy lives, mobile devices and personal preferences are driving this trend, which makes it necessary for media companies to respond with publishing content across channels.

According to comScore’s “Media Metrix Multi-Platform Study” in December 2012, multi platform users in the United States spend about one-third of their time (37 percent) on their mobiles and two-thirds (63 percent) of their time on their desktops.

Online research and learning

One of the key uses for the Internet is researching goods and services, schoolwork, jobs, health issues and the like. Respondents in developed countries tended to research for products more often than those from developing countries, either weekly or monthly, while travel searches were generally less frequent but followed the same pattern. Health searches appeared to be evenly distributed from less than monthly to daily in each country, and, therefore, did not appear to be driven by income.

Job research was much less frequent in each country and evenly distributed throughout each time spectrum. A significant number of respondents in each country responded they “never” researched jobs, followed by the next popular response of “less than monthly.”

While online distance learning elicited very little response across the countries surveyed, weekly and daily homework research was a strong indicator of significant online usage in all of the countries surveyed. Daily schoolwork research was the top response for Australia, New Zealand and Canada, while weekly homework research was first in the remaining countries.

At the rate of some of the mobile Internet access for many of these top sites, many could see mobile access surpassing PC access in a year or two, including Google, Facebook, Amazon, The Weather Channel, Answers.com, Apple, Turner Digital (including CNN), CBS Interactive, eBay and Comcast.

Pandora already reaches double the audience on mobile as it does on PCs, and has bragging rights to the fastest growing Web audience in the Top 25 list, growing at a rate of 155 percent from 2011 to 2012.

Tuesday, October 29, 2013

Global smartphone subscriber growth

Smartphone subscriber growth remains rapid, with an estimated 1.5 billion subscribers, 31 percent growth from 2012 to 2013, and a global penetration of 21 percent, according to Informa, as reported by Mary Meeker’s digital report. By far the highest number of smartphone subscriptions are in China, with 354 million, followed by the United States, with 219 million.

However, the penetration of smartphone subscriptions as a percentage of all mobile subscriptions is highest in Japan, with 76 percent, followed by Korea with 67 percent, Canada with 63 percent, Australia and Sweden with 60 percent, Hong Kong with 59 percent
and the United States and the Netherlands with 58 percent.

Growth of smartphone subscriptions is most swift in Taiwan, with a 60 percent year-over year growth, followed by 52 percent for India, 43 percent for Mexico and 40 percent for Iran.

Smartphone users' gender, age, 2011 - 2012

Smartphone users in America tend to be over 25, equally male and female and tend to earn more than US$50,000 per year. They tend to access mobile app and Web content several times per day. They also tend to access email, listen to music, use a social network, play games, download and use apps, make purchases and read a book, according to the Online Publishers Association’s “Portrait of Today’s Smartphone User” in 2012. Smartphone user numbers are growing rapidly. Thirty-one percent of the respondents owned a smartphone in 2011, which grew to 44 percent in 2012 and is projected to be 57 percent in 2013.

Tuesday, October 22, 2013

Copyright and digital piracy

Digital piracy robs the publishing, book, music and film industries of monetary value, according to a Kantar research report for the United Kingdom’s media regulatory agency Ofcom in 2013. Digital piracy accounts for trillions of dollars of lost sales for these creative media sectors around the world. Pervasive media piracy threatens the future of
media as we know it.

“Piracy reduces the sector’s economic contribution, although estimates of sales losses vary. In this context, suppliers of licensed digital cultural products for sale or for access via a subscription, face an uneven playing field in relation to unlicensed suppliers,” according to Enders Analysis in the United Kingdom.

The European Commission estimates the economic contribution of the “creative industries”, or film, books and music, at 3 percent of GDP, or €500 billion of turnover, according to Enders in 2013. The media industry, including television, radio, newspapers, magazines and digital media typically represents between 1.5 percent and 2.5 percent of a nation’s GDP. The highest media-to-GDP ratios are typically in the most developed countries, according to “The Media Economy”, by Alan B. Abarran.

“Why is piracy prevalent? Common sense indicates that the ‘free’ option to obtain copies of copyrighted content holds instant appeal: no expenditure or payment is required, only a broadband connection. By contrast, the purchaser allocates a share of his income (which reduces expenditure on other items), and must have a means of online payment (credit card, voucher, PayPal). The first peer-reviewed study on piracy in the UK by Ofcom, the regulator, has confirmed that “because it’s free” is by far the most significant driver of piracy, cited by 56 percent of (pirating) respondents,” according to the Enders analysis.

Ofcom completed a study of legal and pirated content consumption in the United Kingdom in 2013 through Kantar research. They found that 20 percent of those who consumed films and 14 percent of those who consumed music did so illegally, while 67 percent of those who consumed films and 74 percent of those who consumed music did so legally. Of all Internet users 12+, the numbers are staggeringly different. Only 14 percent of those who consumed films and 28 percent of those who consumed music did so legally, while 4 percent of film consumers and 5 percent of music consumers did so illegally. The data suggests the ease by which content can be illegally downloaded on the Internet may play a part in the significantly lower number of people who consume content legally online compared to all respondents.

Those respondents who said they have legally consumed content say they access 12 pieces of music, 2 films, 6 TV programs and 2 computer software programs per month, while infringers say they consume 12 music items, 4 films and 4 TV programs, according to the Ofcom study.

Who are the infringers? They tend to be male (59 percent), between 16 and 34 years old (58 percent), and in the ABC1 group more often (59 percent) compared to the C2DE group (41 percent). Legal content consumers tend to be female (53 percent), between the ages of 16 and 34 years old (38 percent) and in the ABC1 age group (69 percent).

The data set is a part of a collection of 500 revenue and usership trends in mobile, social, Internet, tablet, video and other digital categories, published in the 200-page Global Digital Media Trendbook 2013. GDMT, in its eight year, is to be published by World Newsmedia Network, a not-for-profit media research company, in September 2013. To subscribe to the PDF report and/or the tablet edition, go to www.wnmn.org, or contact mstone@wnmn.org.

Plans to purchase consumer electronics in next 12 months, worldwide

Accenture’s 2012 global study of consumer electronics purchase intent underscores the assertions that smartphones and tablets are hot-ticket items. Twenty-six percent of the survey respondents across the world said they intend to buy a smartphone in 2013, a 3 percent increase from 2012’s survey.

Meanwhile, only 5 percent of the respondents said they were going to purchase a regular cell phone, a decrease of 8 percent from the previous year. Tablet purchase intent led the pack of digital devices with the highest growth in purchase intent: 8 percent, with 17 percent of the respondents saying they intend to buy a tablet in 2013.

High-definition television is the second most sought-after digital device, with 20 percent of respondents saying they intend to buy this year; however, the intention to buy an HDTV has dropped five percent since 2012’s survey. Computer purchase intent has held steady since the previous survey, with 17 percent intending to buy this year, a one percent increase from last year.

Thursday, October 17, 2013

Companies with highest digital advertising revenues

Google continues to dominate the digital advertising revenue landscape in the United States, earning almost one-third of the digital advertising pie, or US$12.8 billion in 2011 and $15.4 billion in 2012, according to Pew’s “State of the News Media” report. Facebook’s revenues remain steady at $3.1 billion, while Yahoo earned $1.7 billion in 2011 and $2.2 billion in 2012.

Similarly, Microsoft earned $1.8 billion in 2011 and $2.3 billion in 2012, while AOL remained steady, earning $900 million both years. The second largest slice of the pie goes to “other,” or the hundreds of advertising networks and publishers vying for advertising revenue. The proportion of revenue has increased dramatically in one year, from $10.1 billion to $13.4 billion, according to Pew.

U.S. total media advertising by ad type

Video advertising and sponsorship advertising are on the ascendancy among digital advertising units in the United States; however, search advertising remains king, having grown from US$15.1 billion to $17.58 billion from 2011 to 2012, a 16.4 percent surge. Video advertising is showing particular promise for local publishers and broadcasters looking for lucrative revenue streams for their content businesses. Video advertising fetches sometimes ten times the value of ordinary banner advertising.

Meanwhile, banner ads continue to maintain their stronghold in the No. 2 spot, growing from $7.55 billion to $8.68 billion, a 0.6 percent increase. Rich media and lead generation also grew in the double digits, albeit from a small baseline, according the Pew’s “State of the News Media” research in 2012.

International New York Times to expand opinion pages

The opinion offerings by the New York Times relaunches the International Herald Tribune as The International New York Times on October 15 and is expanding its roster of international opinion writers, RTTNews.com reported. As a part of the expansion plan, more international opinion contributors, new editorial staff, and an additional page in the INYT's weekend edition will be added.

According to a statement by the company, the INYT opinion pages will be edited from Hong Kong, Paris, London, and New York. It will be tailored for global audiences.

The paper's op-ed team announced that it would be hiring 29 opinion writers from countries including Egypt, Bangladesh, Russia, and Poland to contribute monthly columns, according to a report by the ColumbiaJournalism Review. The new opinion writers' diversity also extends to their professions. Not all of them are journalists; handfuls are academics, including political theorists, sociologists, and scholars.

The International New York Times has appointed two part-time editorial board writers: Mira Kamdar, based in Paris, and Masaru Tamamoto, based in Yokohama, Japan. Kamdar is a faculty member of the École de Journalisme at Sciences Po and the author of "Planet India: The Turbulent Rise of the Largest Democracy." Tamamoto has been a senior fellow at the World Policy Institute, a research associate at Cambridge University and a MacArthur Foundation fellow in international peace and security at Princeton University.

According to the press release, The INYT has also assembled a roster of more than two dozen contributing opinion writers who will write monthly columns reflecting perspectives, debates and ideas from around the world.

"The quality and geographic range of voices in the International New York Times Opinion Pages will help ensure that our pages reflect those issues that are the most relevant and compelling to our global readers," said Andrew Rosenthal, editorial page editor of The New York Times. "Our international readers have asked us for more viewpoints from around the globe, and we are delighted to fulfil that request."

By: Savita V Jayaram

HuffPost launches its German online edition

The Huffington Post launched its’ eighth international edition in Munuch, Germany yesterday. This site is an outcome of the recent partnership with Hubert Burda’s Tomorrow Focus Media, which is one of Germany's fastest-growing digital media companies, a release by The Post states.

This is the Post's fifth edition in Europe, following the UK, France, Spain, and Italy. Arianna wrote, "HuffPost Deutschland will be led by editorial director, Cherno Jobatey, who for 20 years was the host of the popular morning show ZDF-Morgenmagazin, and will be both a journalistic outlet and a blogging platform for Germany, Austria, and Switzerland."

HuffPost Deutschland will be relentlessly covering politics, business, and economics, along with stories that encompass everything from sports, technology, and food to media, religion, and entertainment. On the occasion of the German launch, Arianna and HuffPost CEO Jimmy Maymann joined the press conference in Munich's Literaturhaus by Tomorrow Focus AG CEO Toon Boutin, member of the Management Board at Tomorrow Focus AG, Christoph Schuh, Managing Director of Tomorrow Focus Media Oliver Eckert, as well Jobatey and Matthes.

In Arianna’s blog post, she highlighted, "HuffPost Deutschland is launching at a time of transition and disruption in the German media. Blogging is still in its early stages here, which means the opportunities for growth are tremendous for HuffPost, which is a media hybrid -- a combination of a journalistic outlet that last year won a Pulitzer Prize for its investigative reporting and a powerful platform bringing thousands of voices that otherwise would not have a platform into the global conversation. Our goal is not just to be telling the most important stories but to be helping the people of Germany tell their stories themselves -- in words, in pictures, and in video."

The Huffington Post mixes traditional journalism with blogging and user commentary of the digital age, according to dw.de. While many consider it the end of journalism in Germany, others consider Thursday's launch as an effort by the US media giant to foray into another European market and firmly stick its plans to expand its presence in 14 countries by the end of 2014. According to Oliver Eckert of the Tomorrow Focus Media, which publishes the German edition of the Huffington Post, the website will open shop next in Brazil. The Huffington Post's original concept will be adopted by the edition targeting markets in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.

According to dw.de, by the end of 2013, 60 German newspaper publishers want to introduce pay walls for their online editions. Oliver Eckert, publisher of the Huffington Post's German edition said, "The Post's vision will be clear. We welcome the digital transformation, without closing our eyes to the problems." He further hopes that the German edition will turn a profit by 2016 at the latest. Three million Euros have been invested in the German edition and the number of users should rise to 9 million a month. That would make the Huffington Post, with its offices in Munich, the fifth largest news platform in Germany.

According to an earlier announcement by the Post last month, The Post and Abril Group, one of Brazil's largest media conglomerate, announced partnership and unveiled plans to launch the Brazilian edition soon. Jimmy Maymann, CEO of the Huffington Post Media Group said, "This edition will not only put HuffPost in its ninth country and fifth continent, but also will land us at the center of one of the highest-growth regions in the world. Brazil has more than 100 million Internet users, the 5^th largest audience in the world, and is growing fast – 7.6% annually through 2016 according to e-marketer Research." The Brazilian edition of the HuffPost will join the other 40 editorial websites and almost 30 titles available for tablets that Abril runs today.

By: Savita V Jayaram