The Christian Science Monitor announced today that in 2009, they will become the first nationally circulated newspaper that will replace its daily edition with a web-based publication - EXCLUSIVELY.
In an earlier post, I commented a New York Times report that indicated that for the first time, paper consumption in the United States, France, Germany, Japan, Belgium, Sweden, Austria, Canada and Finland actually went down, between 2000 and 2005. (Less developed countries such as China, India, Russia and Mexico continue to increase their paper consumption.) In the same post I commented on how many major university libraries were digitizing their collections.
For years, despite the prevalence of computers and electronic content, we watched paper consumption rise globally, as the more content we created (online) the more we printed (on paper). But a trend is clearly emerging. We are not just eliminating paper for the sake of creating a paperless world (as nobly green as that.) We are also embracing e-content for business reasons as well. Monitor management plans on updating the news continuously throughout the day, better address a web-based readership that continues to grow (1.5 million visits/month) while paper-based subscribers diminish and - lowering publication costs - ah the bottom line.
According to Mr. Wells, The Monitors Managing Publisher, "Changes in the industry - changes in the concept of news and the economics underlying the industry - hit the Monitor first," given its relatively small size and the complex logistics required for national distribution, Mr. Wells said. "We are sometimes forced to be an early change agent."
Yes a trend is clearly emerging that clearly places greater and greater emphasis on ECM. Between changing user expectations and comfort levels for online content (recall the impact of internet-based search on user expectations for enterprise search, as reported in our Market IQ), availability of universal e-content readers such as Kindle, and pressures for lowering costs and greener processes, ECM is poised for critical positioning and growth.
