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Fredrik Linge

The Irish Times is bringing in a very leaky paywall

But one analyst has warned the plan could backfire and send readers to other outlets.

Updated 12.04pm

THE IRISH TIMES will start charging for its online content from next Monday under a “leaky” paywall model.

The newspaper announced today it will charge up to €16 a month for its “premium” digital subscription, while the standard offer will be €12 a month.

The majority of its news content will go behind a leaky paywall – one which allows readers to view up to 10 articles a week for free.

But the paper said articles shared through Google, Facebook and Twitter would also remain free, as would some other content on the site.

Metered, or leaky paywall models, are much simpler to get around than “hard” paywalls, which block all content to non-subscribers.

In most cases, so-minded readers can circumvent weekly or monthly article limits through incognito browsing windows and other tricks.

Paywall Observer.com Observer.com

Plan could backfire

But one analyst has warned the move could drive readers into the arms of its main rival, The Irish Independent.

In a briefing note, Davy’s John Stokes said it would be “very interesting” to monitor the progress of the move, but he expected traffic to the Independent’s website could increase after the move.

Both papers have been shedding distribution and advertising revenue as readers move to online news outlets, with the Independent losing 35% of its circulation and the Times 42% over the past five years, according to the latest National Newspapers of Ireland figures.

Popes Resigns Sam Boal / Photocall Ireland Sam Boal / Photocall Ireland / Photocall Ireland

Second time lucky

Today The Irish Times reported that The Irish Times editor Kevin O’Sullivan said the move would “support future investment in journalism” in print and digital.

This will be The Times’ second stab at charging for online content after an abortive attempt several years ago to make digital users pay.

O’Sullivan later told RTÉ’s Today with Sean O’Rourke the abandoned plan had been “very simplistic”.

“It was almost quite quaint in the sense that a digital story was just putting up text online, now a digital story has many elements to it … it’s a different kind of conversation now,” he said.

He said the subscription fees were “modest” and targeted at the paper’s “more intensely-consuming reader”, and he expected about 85% of its online users wouldn’t be affected.

The Times’ move to a paywall follows similar shifts from papers including the New York Times and UK’s Daily Telegraph, which both introduced online subscriptions much earlier to stem the bleeding from lost print readers.

The New York Times, which first went behind a leaky paywall in 2011, has nearly 1 million digital subscribers, but growth has levelled off.

READ: Opinion: What do traditional newspapers have to do to survive? >

READ: Lots of people are watching UTV Ireland’s big soaps. But not much else… >

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78 Comments
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    Mute Shane Corry
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:32 PM

    Sounds like a complete non-story. So some employee of a contractor made a mistake, it was quickly resolved within an hour and they are getting compensation?

    361
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    Mute happinessnow
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:52 PM

    @Sean Murphy: Is that true? Actually I don’t even know why I ask you that, Lawless Ireland, build more prison spaces ASAP.

    76
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    Mute Candace
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:57 PM

    @Sean Murphy:

    What part of the country?

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    Mute Sean Murphy
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:59 PM
    76
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    Mute Ted Murray
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    Apr 10th 2019, 1:05 PM

    @Sean Murphy: __ He should have one last taxi ride, to Dublin Airport.

    79
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    Mute Sean Murphy
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    Apr 10th 2019, 1:06 PM

    @Candace: Dublin, of course! Our most ‘diverse’ city so therefore our ‘strongest’, or so the leftists say!

    58
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    Mute Dave O'Keeffe
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    Apr 10th 2019, 1:14 PM

    @Sean Murphy: that’s shocking. Our Judiciary is truly fu(ked.

    60
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    Mute gerard carey
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    Apr 10th 2019, 1:17 PM

    @Sean Murphy: You won’t hear about that on the journal. Independent.ie covered it. It’s like a bad April fools joke.

    64
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    Mute Shane Corry
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    Apr 10th 2019, 1:24 PM

    @Sean Murphy: Wow that judgement is horrendous though I can’t say it isn’t typical of the Irish judicial system – the only country that allows those with 100s of previous convictions to repeately get away with crimes with no punishment.

    He has two teenage daughters too according to that article while the women he assaulted were in their teens or early 20s! Should have had his taxi license revoked & imprisoned for at least 6 months.

    62
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    Mute Dermot Foley
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    Apr 10th 2019, 2:30 PM

    @Sean Murphy: what exactly is your point. Whataboutery of the highest order. Was it just to mention the fact he’s from Pakistan?

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    Mute Has-an
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    Apr 10th 2019, 2:30 PM

    @Sean Murphy: there is a big problem in Irish law Enforce.
    How he could let get out of it and permit to continue driving taxi?

    23
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    Mute Sean Murphy
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    Apr 10th 2019, 4:48 PM

    @Dermot Foley: Well my point was obvious to anyone with a room temperature IQ. Someone being mildly inconvenienced at an airport is much less newsworthy than a foreign taxi driver sexually assaulting Irish women and being allowed to continue drive taxis as long as the women sit in the back seat. They have since deleted my comment and finally reported on it.

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    Mute Dave O'Keeffe
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    Apr 10th 2019, 5:36 PM

    @Sean Murphy: question, wasn’t one of the women German? And also what the hell does it matter where the women are from?

    11
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    Mute Mark Plunkett
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    Apr 10th 2019, 8:50 PM

    @Sean Murphy: just read that story what a joke,just make sure the girls sit in the back of the cab when you go out hunting again for the 4th time,some joke of a country we have become??

    9
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    Mute Rei
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    Apr 10th 2019, 10:32 PM

    @Sean Murphy: what does it matter where he’s from? It doesnt.
    It’s just an excuse for xenophobia. Plenty of Irish lads just as despicable.

    1
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    Mute Eoin O'C
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:55 PM

    “If you love me, make some noise”

    Jesus, that’s some ego he’s got. Nothing like a bit of twitter-fuelled self-entitlement to get your way

    247
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    Mute Jindrich Marz
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    Apr 10th 2019, 3:18 PM

    @Eoin O’C: Not to get his way but to get the legal way.

    18
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    Mute Conor Kennelly
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    Apr 10th 2019, 3:36 PM

    @Eoin O’C: what’s your issue, he was only asking for what he was perfectly entitled to, the freedom to travel to this country for which he had the correct travel documents.

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    Mute Rei
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    Apr 10th 2019, 10:34 PM

    @Eoin O’C: I don’t see the problem. Companies react when they’re blasted on social media. Smart move really.

    1
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    Mute Coco86
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:30 PM

    Human error…… Happens to us all

    114
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    Mute Coco86
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:31 PM

    @Coco86: Plus Ryanair have resolved the situation. The only outrage here is the lengths people have to go through for decent customer service from Ryanair!

    117
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    Mute Shane Corry
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:34 PM

    @Coco86: He posted it on Twitter, they replied in less than an hour, before the tweet had gotten popular and managed to resolve it while he kept tweeting swear words at them repeatedly https://twitter.com/iyad_elbaghdadi/status/1115906034814599168. I don’t get the issue here.

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    Mute Neil Ryan
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:38 PM

    @Shane Corry: He lost any sympathy as soon as he resorted to using foul language.

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    Mute Coco86
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:43 PM

    @Shane Corry: Fair enough, hadn’t seen tweets from him to Ryanair

    17
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    Mute Dave O'Keeffe
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    Apr 10th 2019, 1:21 PM

    @Shane Corry: where in that thread is it resolved? The guy once spent 26 days in an airport due to a similar issue. It’s understandable that he would be agitated.

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    Mute Dave O'Keeffe
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    Apr 10th 2019, 5:37 PM

    @Neil Ryan: yeah, fu(k him, he said a naughty word!

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    Mute Neil Ryan
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    Apr 10th 2019, 5:41 PM

    @Dave O’Keeffe: Don’t get me wrong – I swear like a sailor! But as soon as you use it on a public forum, you lose the higher ground.

    13
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    Mute Dave O'Keeffe
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    Apr 11th 2019, 12:00 AM

    @Neil Ryan: no you don’t, they’re words. Obviously staff on the ground were completely unhelpful to say he needed to go online while already in the airport.

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    Mute GRANjzT
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:45 PM

    This man threw his toys out of the pram like some moody teenage boy and started f-ing and blinding at some poor Ryanair staff member online who was trying to resolve the issue. In spite of this, they still resolved his problem and put him on the next flight with compensation. He didn’t deserve to get on their flights at all after that public foul mouthed tirade.

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    Mute Finn H. Schoyen
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:49 PM

    @GRANjzT: wouldn’t you be angry if something like this happened to you?

    32
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    Mute Coco86
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:54 PM

    @Finn H. Schoyen: Yes of course but do you think he handled the situation correctly?

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    Mute John Horan
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:59 PM

    @GRANjzT: maybe he is like the guy from the AIB story yesterday…the compensation only compounded the problem apparently

    10
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    Mute Alan Scott
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    Aug 12th 2023, 7:54 AM

    @GRANjzT: I have seen a lot of foul mouthed words on Journal.ie over the years Journal mods done absolutely nothing about it.

    1
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    Mute conor Murphy
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    Apr 10th 2019, 1:13 PM

    The one thing I would love to know and it has little to do with this story and that is, what percentage of crimes are committed in this country by foreign nationalist ??

    58
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    Mute Karen Wellington
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    Apr 10th 2019, 2:17 PM

    @conor Murphy: it has nothing to do with this article. Maybe submit an FOI to Dept Justice

    20
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    Mute Rei
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    Apr 10th 2019, 10:36 PM

    @conor Murphy: why do you care? Seems plenty of Irish people commit lots of crimes abroad. Do you want those statistics too? Somehow I doubt it. You’re just looking for an excuse.

    1
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    Mute Candace
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:54 PM

    Arab spring was a failure in the end, all it sprung was more misery.

    76
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    Mute Nicky O'Donnell
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:35 PM

    No RyanAir. It was not your ‘handling agent’. They were your employees that you didn’t train properly, as per usual.

    43
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    Mute Noel Brennan
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:33 PM

    I hope he won’t be waiting ten months for compensation from Ryanair, and won’t have to jump through hoops, like I was.

    28
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    Mute Toomasu Sumitsu
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    Apr 10th 2019, 1:17 PM

    People that work in airports aren’t trained properly. Lufthansa staff stopped my girlfriend from boarding a flight to Dublin because they thought it was in the UK and she didn’t have a UK visa. Ryanair regularly stop Taiwanese travelling too because they think they have to follow the same procedures as the Chinese. Generally explaining geography and visa rules overcomes the issue.

    21
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    Mute Mike Conway
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    Apr 10th 2019, 3:36 PM

    He should have been kept out.

    20
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    Mute Patricia Kiersey
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    Apr 10th 2019, 6:42 PM

    Iyad El Baghdadi is a well respected human rights campaigner. It is embarrassing that he had such an experience on his way to this country. How demeaning and frustrating it must have been, especially as all his paperwork as absolutely in order. No doubt he missed attending the meeting he was coming to participate in, since it looks as if there were no other flights until this evening from Berlin to Dublin. I welcome him here and I hope the rest of his stay will be fulfilling.

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    Mute PV Nevin
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    Apr 10th 2019, 1:14 PM
    6
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    Mute Niall Sheridan
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:40 PM

    Clowns

    6
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    Mute Kieran Cronin
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    Apr 10th 2019, 8:29 PM

    muslim brotherhood travelling to ireland for a meeting ?????

    6
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    Mute David Jordan
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    Apr 10th 2019, 8:41 PM

    @Kieran Cronin: Eh no, he’s a vocal critic of Hamas, who were established in 1987 by a group of Muslim Brotherhood activists.

    “So here’s me saying it again: Hamas is a destructive organization and its effect on the Palestinian struggle has been nothing short of a catastrophe.” – İyad el-Baghdadi

    https://twitter.com/iyad_elbaghdadi/status/1109886173537886208

    4
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