This article is more than 9 years old

This article is more than 9 years old

In April, I mentioned an initiative in Slovakia in which nine leading news organisations went behind a single paywall.

Now the organiser of the project, Piano Media, proudly reports that it took €40,000 (£35,200) in its first month of operation.

The smallness of that number needs to be seen in the context of the country's 2.5m population of net users and low income levels.

Piano Media's founder, Tomáš Bella, said that unique visitors to most of the sites have increased since they started charging for access.

"We achieved our subscriber target within two days of launching the system," he said.

"People quickly understood the concept of cable TV-like subscription and it seems, at €2.90, we got the price right as well."

Subscribers pay either €2.90 (£2.55) per month or €29 (£25) a year for the service.

Some 70% of the revenue goes to participating publishers, which include Slovakia's oldest daily Pravda, its leading broadsheet SME and the business paper Hospodarske noviny.

A second wave of publishers based in Bratislava are expected to join the project soon and Piano is also exploring expansion to other European countries by the end of the year.

Source: Piano Media