Payperarticle. Roy Greenslade: Exclusive interview with Financial Times chief executive | Media. Last week's results for FT Publishing, the division of Pearson that contains the Financial Times, looked bleak. Profits fell 40% in the first half of the year compared to the same period in 2008. But all may not be as it seemed. Aside from the FT, the FT Publishing division is composed of Mergermarket, 50% of The Economist and joint ventures with FTSE, Vedemosti and BDFM in South Africa. Though the results for each component are not published, I understand from "people familiar with the situation" - as the FT's reporters are given to describing their anonymous sources - that the paper itself turned a profit. That may well explain why Pearson's ceo, Marjorie Scardino, appeared somewhat relaxed about the results. She also knows that, in the current circumstances, with virtually all serious newspapers in Britain and the States losing money, it is a remarkable performance for the FT to make a profit.
He added: "You have to see this in the context of price rises for the print editions. ‘Because We’re Worth It’: FT.com Going Even More Premium. The Financial Times website sought to show off its long-time paid content credentials as Murdoch made his volte face this summer – effectively: we’re awesome and indispensible, so people will buy us. Now it’s adding what it hopes will be more reasons to take out its £99-a-year subscription… – A monthly Editor’s Newsletter from FT ed Lionel Barber, “highlighting big themes for the month ahead and providing updates and insights on new site features”. – Page-turning electronic editions at www.ft.com/FTePaper – FT Newsmine: a Friday email “that abstracts hidden nuggets from FT articles”.
FT says these “enhance” its premium offering, but they don’t seem to offer any hugely compelling new reason to subscribe (Barber’s newsletter is only monthly, and why are there “hidden nuggets” in FT articles at all?). FT’s premium model has been going just fine of late. Paying subs are up 22 percent from last year to 121,000, FT.com MD Rob Grimshaw says in the announcement. Podcast, audio downloads for business and arts from Financial Times - FT.comPodcast, audio downloads for business and arts from Financial Times - FT.com.