{"id":5650,"date":"2011-04-23T05:01:52","date_gmt":"2011-04-23T03:01:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/english.martinvarsavsky.net\/?p=5650"},"modified":"2011-04-23T05:06:44","modified_gmt":"2011-04-23T03:06:44","slug":"matthias-dopfner-of-axel-springer-and-the-future-of-newspapers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/english.martinvarsavsky.net\/?p=5650","title":{"rendered":"Mathias D\u00f6pfner of Axel Springer and the future of newspapers"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Just had dinner with my friend Mathias D\u00f6pfner<\/a>, the CEO of Axel Springer<\/a> one of Germany<\/a>‘s top media and newspaper groups. \u00a0During dinner we spoke about the future of newspapers, a subject very relevant to him since his company still makes most of their revenues and earnings from them. \u00a0 Indeed Axel Springer has Bild<\/a>, the largest circulation paper in Europe, it also has the less popular but more informative Die Welt<\/a>. \u00a0In our conversation a trend came up that is worth sharing.<\/p>\n

While downloading without paying has caused tremendous revenue erosion for record labels and studios, it is the culture of everything on the internet should be free that is hurting newspapers. \u00a0In the case of newspapers it is not that people copy their content online for all to get it for free. \u00a0What happens in the print industry is that owners put the content online and the revenues they make on online advertising do not compensate what they lose in print. \u00a0But that is because the PC is an instrument that has made people used to not paying. While in print content owners can both sell the newspaper or magazine AND make money from advertising very few are willing to pay for content delivered to their PC. \u00a0 \u00a0People have come to expect that everything that happens in a PC other than paying your DSL\/Cable\/Fiber provider should be free. \u00a0But this is a psychological stance. \u00a0It is hard to understand why this is the case but what is clear is that with other hardware come different habits. \u00a0So the same is not true of smartphones and tablets. \u00a0In a way what Apple has done is made people used to paying again both for apps (formerly known as software) and for content through iTunes. \u00a0And that is also happening with Android<\/a> both for smartphones and soon for tablets (Android tablets are still not a real contender for the iPad<\/a> but Android smartphones are for the iPhone). \u00a0So as people migrate from PCs to smartphones and tablets they will not find it offensive to pay, just like they don’t find it offensive to pay in the Sony PS3<\/a>, or in Microsoft XBOX<\/a>. \u00a0Bottom line is this: if you have content think less of PCs and the web as we know it and more of smartphones, tablets and gaming platforms. \u00a0That’s where the money is. \u00a0Or may be. \u00a0In the meantime Axel Springer is doing a remarkable transformation from offline to online. \u00a0This migration should be good inspiration for my friends who run the New York Times, El Pais and other newspapers and magazines.<\/p>\n

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Just had dinner with my friend Mathias D\u00f6pfner, the CEO of Axel Springer one of Germany‘s top media and newspaper groups. \u00a0During dinner we spoke about the future of newspapers, a subject very relevant to him since his company still makes most of their revenues and earnings from them. \u00a0 Indeed Axel Springer has Bild, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[8],"tags":[550],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.martinvarsavsky.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5650"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.martinvarsavsky.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.martinvarsavsky.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.martinvarsavsky.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.martinvarsavsky.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5650"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/english.martinvarsavsky.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5650\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.martinvarsavsky.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5650"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.martinvarsavsky.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5650"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.martinvarsavsky.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5650"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}