Saturday, December 11, 2010

Are iPad apps killing newspapers?

As if the newspaper biz needed more bad news (here's yet another report on declining ad revenues), a survey says that heavy iPad users are more likely to cancel their newspaper subscriptions: "The survey showed that 58 percent of respondents who use the Apple tablet at least an hour a day for news are very likely to cancel their subscription in the next six months."

Actually, I wasn't all that impressed with this result after I pondered it. iPad users -- early adopters of new technology -- are probably younger than the populace as a whole, and therefore more likely to discontinue newspaper subscriptions (and less likely to subscribe in the first place). In addition, it seems hardly surprising that anyone who reads an hour of news per day online (via any technology) would be contemplating unsubscribing.

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