Mail+ hits 100,000 subs | Ex-Sun royal editor on 'toxic' newsroom of 2000s
Plus your news diary for the week ahead and a sponsored story on how SWNS thrived to hit its 50th birthday
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The Daily Mail today joins the exclusive club of fewer than 40 English-language news publishers worldwide who have reached more than 100,000 online subscribers.
If Mail+ subscribers were paying full price (which they aren't) they would bring in just over £8m a year, which is a long way short of covering the costs of the Mail newsroom.
But this is nonetheless a hugely encouraging sign that quality tabloid journalism has a future in a purely digital age.
The sort of articles which Mail Online charges for are recognisable as journalism because they are original, in-depth comment and reports that you can't find elsewhere (unlike much made for advertising online churnalism).
Local news agencies, the eyes and ears of the UK national press, are sadly an endangered species nowadays.
But one outfit, Bristol-based SWNS, has managed to buck the trend. We spoke to editor and director Martin Winter to find out how it has grown into a highly diversified 50-journalist media business in the first of a series of sponsored articles to celebrate its 50th anniversary year.
And today we also have a rare interview with a senior Sun insider from the 2000s, former royal editor for the tabloid Duncan Larcombe.
He spoke to me as he published a memoir, ironically titled: "The Scum That I've Become."
If the "dark arts" can have a heyday, the early 2000s is probably when it was.
Larcombe shared his perspective on both newsroom culture and Prince Harry's belief that he was the subject of a vast illegal newsgathering conspiracy waged by the Sun, Mirror and Mail publishers.
Today we also have your news diary for the week ahead, which is dominated by the COP29 climate conference in Azerbaijan.
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On Press Gazette
Mail Online hits 100,000 paying subscribers
Daily Mail editor-in-chief Ted Verity said: “The success of Mail+ is proof that readers are happy to pay for the kind of high-quality journalism the Mail has long been famous for.”
Former royal editor: Sun newsroom was ‘toxic’ but Harry legal claim is ‘deluded’
While Duncan Larcombe clearly enjoyed his time at The Sun, he also paid a heavy price for his successful tabloid career. He was diagnosed with PTSD after covering the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami for the paper in Thailand. And he also spent more than 1,000 days on police bail before standing trial in 2015 over payments to sources.
SWNS at 50: ‘Culture of excellence’ behind success of biggest independent UK news agency (sponsored)
Still based in its home city of Bristol, today SWNS has reporters around the country, a secondary office in London and says it is the largest supplier of content to the national media after the corporate news agencies.
News diary 11 – 17 November: COP29, ruling due on Shell’s Dutch climate judgment appeal
A look ahead at the key events leading the news agenda this week, from the team at Foresight News.
News in brief
Articles about the US election generated 43 million page views in the UK on 5 and 6 November, according to Taboola. That compares with 155 million page views for election articles in the US over the same period and 2.5 million page views for Budget-related articles in the UK last month.
Speaking to Semafor about the election, New Yorker editor-in-chief David Remnick has said editors didn't have "the illusion that they were speaking to a majority of the electorate". Axios founder Jim VandeHei said: "The verdict is not debatable: Half the country thinks traditional media is biased and often useless". (Semafor)
Financial Times US news editor Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson is leaving the business paper after 27 years to take up a new role at Semafor. (Semafor)
This week on Press Gazette:
Guido Fawkes appeals for donations to fund Dale Vince libel fight
Digitalbox buys three GRV Media sites in ‘entertainment powerhouse’ bid
Comscore data: Independent overtook Mail and Guardian in US in September
How Newsweek became world’s fastest-growing English language news website
Publishers hooked on Google Discover traffic risk race to the bottom
Podcast 77: Election endorsements, revolting Guardian journalists and regulating AI
Press Gazette editor-in-chief Dominic Ponsford and reporter Bron Maher provide an insider take on three of the hottest issues in news media: how did the Washington Post handle its election endorsement so badly? Why are Guardian and Observer journalists set to go on strike? And what can publishers do about the onslaught of generative AI bots harvesting their content without permission?