The Dutch newspaper Nederlands Dagblad (ND) is going to charge readers for online (copyright-protected) content, according to Emerce.nl. 

The ND is not the first newspaper to ‘build’ a so-called Paywall in the Netherlands. The Dutch financial newspaper, Financieele Dagblad already set up a paywall. In the U.S., the New York Times and in the UK the British Times also uses this business model. Recently, the French newspaper La Tribune also launched the Paywall model.

It looks like the newspapers are simply not getting enough revenues from the ads online. The ND reports that due to the rise of digital reading and the investments thereof, this requires the publisher to look at a new revenue model. Free online news for the Dutch newspaper is not sustainable, even with the sale of advertisements. Moreover, the ND notes that their news and background stories, analysis and opinion articles are worth paying for.

Reference: Emerce.nl