Wiener Zeitung, a Vienna-based newspaper, printed its final daily edition on Friday, nearly 320 years after it first appeared in 1703, driven off newsstands because ad revenue has decreased and the physical copy cannot be sustained.
The world’s oldest national newspaper has gone entirely online after a recent legal reform rendered it unprofitable as a print offering.
The measure, passed in April by Austria’s coalition government, repealed a legal requirement that firms pay to publish public notifications in the newspaper’s print edition, effectively ending Wiener Zeitung’s status as an official gazette.
According to Der Spiegel, this adjustment resulted in an estimated €18 million (£15 million) loss of income for the publisher, forcing the paper to lose 63 employees, including lowering its editorial team from 55 to 20.
The daily will continue to publish online and hopes to produce a monthly print edition, though that plan is said to be in the works.
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