e-expansion Monday

The Toronto Sun's e-edition is barely a week old and Sunday Media has announced 32 more papers will go e on Monday.

Major beefs with the Toronto version in its infancy is the absence of the sports section and Friday's entertainment section, along with other assorted pieces of the paper.

A page count comparison for the Sunday Sun's e-edition should be interesting. 

We have yet to read or hear whether the exclusion of sports and other pages is strictly for the 14-day free trial period, or will it be a permanent condensed online tab? 

If permanent, the $4.99 a month subscription offer doesn't sound half as appealing.

Sun Media should make it clear one way or the other before signing people up for paid services.

A Marketwire press release yesterday announcing the expansion to 32 other Sun Media newspapers says the e-editions are the work of a Vancouver company.

"The Sun Media e-edition was developed in cooperation with NewspaperDirect, a Vancouver-based company that works with 750 newspaper and magazine publishers from 80 countries around the globe to market and sell hardcopy and digital editions their publications worldwide."

So Sun style to describe the service will be e-edition, not E-edition? Good to know. 

"The service delivers e-editions of all the Sun dailies in major urban markets plus other daily and non-daily publications."

They include free e-editions of the free 24 hours newspapers.

"After the free trial, the e-edition will be offered at a nominal fee to existing subscribers; the 24 hours free dailies will be accessible at no cost."

Style again. Does the Sun's new style guide mention 24 Hours, or is it 24 hours? 

Speaking of style, would the e-edition thumbnail index subheads not look more Sun-ish if they were iconic Sun red with bold white type instead of fuzzy green with white type?  Just a thought.