Times for a Sunday

In my younger days, when the world existed in black and white (or so my wife believes), my weekly rituals included the purchase of The Sunday Times. It was not so much the journalistic content, it was more to do with the sheer size of the thing. Never mind the quality, look at all these supplements.

Sunday morning was not complete without a trip to the newsagents to pick up a copy, which would then be scattered over the sofa for the rest of the day and consumed piecemeal over the following week.

Then we moved from North East England to Scotland, and I was aghast to discover that the ST did not make the journey north until mid-afternoon. So much for Sunday morning coffee and the ST magazine. I should have checked before accepting the move.

Then a transfer to The Hague where I imagined my ST days would be over, and I would be reduced to looking at the pictures in De Telegraaf. But no. A pleasant cycle down to the main railway station on a Sunday morning would find the paper waiting for me at the bookstore. Civilised Sundays were restored, surrounded by more print than I could read, with inky fingers and a feeling of contentment.

But then I came to Asia, and although Kuala Lumpur and other locations offered the ST, it could not be found on a Sunday, was only a re-print of some of the content, and it cost a fortune. My Sunday Times Sundays were over.

Until today.

Now I have this on my iPad:

Every section of the paper is available (five further sections are not shown above, but they are just a scroll down the screen away). If I am not interested in a particular section, I just don’t bother to download it (no point in reading about sport outside of the Grand Prix season).

And it is beautifully implemented. Scroll down to read an article. scroll right to move to the next. Tap a photo to see it in full screen and, where indicated, scroll to then watch a slideshow. I never felt I was lost, and often felt I was being offered much more than I would receive if all I had was the printed page. The text is crisp and easy to read, the photos are high-resolution, and there are even videos on offer, which are hard to implement in the printed edition.

What’s missing? Just the advertisements as far as I can tell; although there are a few single page adverts included, most of which link to a video and can be easily ignored. And the Classifieds section only has four advertisements; so I am going for the position as Programme Controls Director with Crossrail; which I think means I will work in a signal box for a six figure salary.

The price is $2.99, which means I will not indulge weekly (unless I get the job in the signal box); but it is comforting to know that my favourite newspaper is now available when I feel the need.

And no more inky fingers.

Comments 🔗

2010-12-27 | Barry says

But come on - it’s not really the same as having the print edition, is it. Same as reading books on a mobile device hasn’t caught on. You need the thing in your hands for the ‘real experience’. The next generation might think differently, of course. By the way, the Sunday New York Times is a real piece of work that makes the UK version look a real wuss by comparison. But at least half of every page is adverts. Not really connected, but I was reminded about an interesting experience trying to buy the Bangkok Post in my local Bangkok store some years ago. They only had the paper for the previous day, and the owner of the shop was refusing to sell todays as yestedays hadn’t sold out yet. One of those Only In Thailand moments…

2010-12-27 | Spike says

I agree, it is not the same. It’s easier to read, more convenient (in bed, on the toilet), and I really like the photos which can now be properly appreciated. Given the choice, I would not go back to paper.

Reading books on a device hasn’t caught on?

Amazon customers are now buying more e-books than hardcover books. In a press release, CEO Jeff Bezos said:

We’ve reached a tipping point with the new price of Kindle—the growth rate of Kindle device unit sales has tripled since we lowered the price from $259 to $189. In addition, even while our hardcover sales continue to grow, the Kindle format has now overtaken the hardcover format. Amazon.com customers now purchase more Kindle books than hardcover books—astonishing when you consider that we’ve been selling hardcover books for 15 years, and Kindle books for 33 months.

The company also noted that, in the past month, the sales of Kindle books is nearly 2:1 over hardcovers, with 180 Kindle books selling for every 100 hardcovers. Further, the company said it sold more than 3 times as many Kindle books in the first half 2010 than it did in the first half of 2009.

It’s catching on. Never going to replace real books, but there will be an increasing market share.

Your story is typically Thai. I went to buy some shoes. Chose a pair that I liked. Size 10 please. No have, how about size 8.

2010-12-27 | Camberley says

The Times have a strange pricing strategy, subscribe to the online Times and Sunday times for £2 a week and get Times on the iPad for free (compared with £10 for 30 days). It doesn’t seem to extend to the iPad Sunday Times though.

2010-12-27 | Barry says

I’ll believe more people are buying e-books when I see people on the London tube reading a Kindle rather than with a book in their hand. Admittedly I haven’t been there since July, but I have never seen anyone using one. Plenty reading ‘old-fashioned’ books though.

2010-12-27 | TheSon says

Barry - if you travel on the metro in the US you will see scores of people reading Kindles or Sony equivalents; it will happen here, give it a year for the Kindle & co to proliferate (and for Amazon to coerce more publishers into getting into eBooks).

I was ready to be unconvinced by the Kindle, but my 3rd gen one is now a prized possession. The screen delivers superb, paper-like visuals and I can finally take as many books as I want on holiday without hiring a butler to drag a steamer trunk full of paperbacks.

2010-12-27 | biggrtiggr says

Impressive statistics for kindle (lies, damned lies..??)

I wonder how many of the titles sold are ’new’ or how many are people augmenting their library of hardback favourites with the E versions?

PS…. Sunday Sport has better pictures than the Times

2010-12-28 | Billy the Brush says

Steamer trunk? … good Lord, your Dad been telling you stories about the old days again???

2010-12-28 | Spike says

We were so poor we lived in a steamer trunk in’t middle of road.

2010-12-28 | Billy the Brush says

Luxury ….

2010-12-28 | Billy the Brush says

Is Bozo being disingenuous when he makes comparisons with “hardcover books” ?

Does “hardcover” in ‘murican = hardback in English? Is so then of far more relevance would be to compare sales of paperbacks or even total sales of hardbacks + paperbacks with sales of e-books.

I am only guessing but I’m pretty sure that paperback sales are at least 10 times those of hardbacks …