Online Journalism News

The Times takes online TV live and launches e-magazine

The Times has gone live with Times TV, its online TV service, and has also launched an E-magazine.

Despite initial speculation that Times TV may marry-up content produced by other companies owned by News Corporation - such as BskyB and Fox entertainment - the majority of the hard news content on the service is sourced from Reuters.

However, other third party news sources are expected to start providing content soon, although The Times was unable to say whether this will include programmes from under the Murdoch umbrella.

Peter Bale, editorial director of Times Online, said:

"Video is an important and essential part of any multimedia offering and we hope this is a toe in the water that will give our readers something to stay on the site longer for.

"We expect to add more original content shortly and use it as a vehicle to get more experience ourselves in multimedia that is consistent with the brand values of The Times and The Sunday Times."

The public launch has so far been low-key with the service accessed from the front page under the sound and vision navigation.

Les Hinton, executive chairman of News International, News Corp's British newspaper wing, announced news of the service during a speech at the World Newspaper Congress, in Moscow, earlier this week.

The move followed the announcement by Channel 4 that it was entering the radio market by offering an online service.

The online newspaper has also launched an e-magazine. The site is calling the Flash software-developed e-zine 'the most beautiful publication on the web'.

The Times is believed to be looking at using the experimental format in future for other online magazines.

The e-magazine mimics the look of a high-end glossy woman's magazine with features on luxury goods and fashion.

It contains a feature that allows the reader to turn the pages of the magazine as if they were turning the pages of a printed publication.

By clicking on certain highlighted names in the text the reader is also able to change the pictures on the page to the corresponding celebrity.

A similar device shadows out images of luxury furniture and overlays the shadow with text about the product.

Tags (click tag to find related articles; click icon for feed):
reuters | news corporation | news international | the times | times online | peter bale | les hinton | online service | ezine | online newspaper | congress | online magazines | moscow | emagazine |

Sign up here for our free, daily email newsletter to get all the latest stories, jobs, tips and more.

Got a story? Email our news team: Laura Oliver; Judith Townend or telephone +44 (0)1273 384290. You can also follow us on Twitter: @journalismnews / @LauraOliver / @JTownend.