Christian Science Monitor Shifts To 24/7 Web & Weekly Print Publication
BOSTON, MA (October 28, 2008) – After publishing a daily newspaper for more than 100 years, the Christian Science Monitor announced that in April 2009 it will switch to an emphasis on Web publishing and will print only a weekly weekend edition.
By doing so the Monitor becomes the first "national" newspaper to shift from a daily format to a daily 24/7 online publication. The Monitor said today that beginning in April 2009 it will publish a constantly-updated Web site, a daily electronic subscription product, and a once-a-week print edition.
In the announcement the paper said today, "As recent years have shown, the future of journalism is the Internet ... By launching its new Web-first format, the Monitor is remaining consistent with its original vision to be a daily publication as laid out by Monitor founder Mary Baker Eddy. With the full commitment to 24/7 coverage via the Internet, the Monitor is now a true daily news outlet."
"We have the luxury — the opportunity — of making a leap that most newspapers will have to make in the next five years," Monitor editor John Yemma said.
When Montior correspondent David Rohde was taken prisoner in Bosnia in 1995, The Monitor was one of the first newspapers in America to publish content online.
Today the Monitor showed readers design prototypes of the new weekly newspaper and the new look for their Web site (both at right).
Founded in 1908, the Monitor has a photography staff of four (two editors, two shooters). There are 130 staff members, with approximately 100 on the editorial operation. The Monitor said today's announced changes will mean that layoffs are necessary, but the company didn't offer any estimate on how many jobs will be cut.
"In the Monitor's next century, as with its first century, it is committed to finding answers to the world's most important problems, asking the questions that matter and getting the story behind the news - all of which is staying true to Mrs. Eddy's unselfish, original vision," Yemma said. "The Monitor's role is right there in its name. It's to monitor the world, to keep an eye on the world from a perspective of hope."
The Monitor is an independent newspaper funded by the Christian Science Church. The winner of seven Pulitzer Prizes, the Monitor has been struggling financially for decades. The paper says they are currently posting net loses of $18.9 million a year on $12.5 million in revenue. By changing to weekly print publication the Monitor hopes to cut their losses to $10.5 million within five years. Current circulation is 56,000, but the paper once celebrated a circulation of more than 225,000 in 1970.
The Monitor's new weekly print edition will launch in April and be priced at $3.50 per copy or $89 for a year's subscription. A full-price subscription to the current daily print edition is $219.
"We hope the people who subscribe to the daily will shift to the weekly and that many more who may not have had time to read the daily will find the weekly appeals to them," Yemma said in today's Monitor.
While the Monitor is not the first American newspaper to put its publishing emphasis mostly on the Internet, it is certainly the biggest and one with a long-standing national audience. In April, The Capital times in Madison, WI, stunned its staff with a sudden shift to Internet publishing, and in July in Superior, WI, The Daily Telegram went to print publishing only two days per week with daily news publishing on the Web.
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