Nuus24 to close its doors

 ·11 Jun 2013
Nuus24

Naspers owned online news publisher, 24.com has decided to disband its Afrikaans Nuus24 channel.

The group said in a statement on Tuesday (11 June) that while Nuus24 has generated “excellent engagement” for its audiences and advertisers, “the team believe that they cannot scale the operation to the same levels as News24”.

Nuus24 hosts Afrikaans newspaper websites for BeeldDie Burger and Volksblad, thus making News24/Nuus24 the largest supplier of Afrikaans news content.

Jannie Momberg, editor of News24 and Nuus24 said: “We do still believe Afrikaans speaking consumers need and deserve to get the latest breaking news, information and entertainment on any device. We believe that these features and services will be provided by the digital arms of South Africa’s three top Afrikaans newspapers: Beeld, Die Burger and Volksblad.”

As of 1 July, Nuus24 said that consumers will be redirected to the most relevant web property where they will receive the same fast breaking news that they have come to enjoy on Nuus24.

“Management would like to assure advertisers that all campaigns booked via The SpaceStation up to and including 30 June 2013 will be honoured. Thereafter all future campaign enquiries can be directed to Ads24,” the company said.

In April, Afrikaans newspaper titles Beeld, Volksblad, and Die Burger all took the decision to run the gauntlet by adopting a paywall system.

All three titles, which function under the Naspers brand, announced separately that they would be adopting a digital first method of operation, breaking news online, and charging a fee for accessing their content.

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