The former ‘Sydney Morning Herald’ editor-in-chief, proprietor of Text Media and the ‘Melbourne Weekly’ – which he sold to his former bosses for $67 million in 2003 – and current chairman of Crikey, Business Spectator and the Eureka Report, is up to something which could prove a model for online publishers.

On the face of it, managing director and publisher Paul Hamra is the person making the comments on behalf of Solstice Media, the publisher of the new Adelaide digital daily, ‘InDaily’, (www.indaily.com.au)

which made news this week by eating its parent: With some remarks about it seeming “senseless to crush trees” for a (dwindling) print readership, Hamra says the company has “simply changed the delivery vehicle”.

No apology necessary: Just a pragmatic approach to the ongoing reality of being an independent player, especially one in a town dominated by a much larger one. Not quite a one-voice town, but if you want to read a national, metropolitan or suburban paper here, there’s little alternative to Rupert Murdoch’s in the city which was the birthplace of his empire.

A market in which the establishment of a new news product has not been without its problems: The ‘Independent Weekly’ launched as a Sunday broadsheet in 2004, and moved to a tabloid format with a Saturday distribution slot a year later. And from a peak of 12,000 copies, weekly sales are reported to have fallen back to about 8000 against the just short of 243,000 the News-owned ‘Advertiser’ claims on Saturdays.

But forget that – Hamra will tell you in any case that expectations were always bigger than their business plan – and coo over the new baby and its proud parents.

‘InDaily’ is a newsletter, mailed out at midday each day, but one which presents in an attractive iPad-friendly landscape format. But it’s not an app, and its publishers claim a revenue model based on advertising will ensure it remains free to subscribers (we counted five sponsors, plus promotions and a thin smattering of advertisements).

The technology is based on a version of RealView’s digital page-turner, modified to give an iPad-like ‘sliding’ effect without the need for a finger-sensitive tablet. The result is a fashionable look, but one which works on PCs and tablets, as well as the iPad and even iPhone. With videos presented via YouTube, there are no Flash issues either. Solstice’s technology pioneering also extends to the use of the browser-based Roxen editorial system.

Of the new ‘InDaily’ product, Hamra says they can get it to a “bigger and growing audience, faster and cheaper”.

Despite the appointment of a new editor-in-chief – Des Ryan, formerly of the Fairfax ‘Canberra Sunday Times’, but well known in Adelaide – and syndicated Fairfax material,  we reckon there’s a need to work on content: Today’s edition had a story count of 32 – mostly via links to story pages – plus a Domain-branded property page and weather.

An online version of the ‘Weekly’ had already accumulated a subscriber base of 30,000

over the couple of years. You’d have every reason to expect that to grow with the new daily format, but we suspect regulars will expect something more for their investment in time.

Beecher could be just the man to give it to them. Announcing the ‘InDaily’ launch in September, Beecher’s ‘Crikey’ modestly reported, “the Beecher-Ryan intervention amounts to a relaunch, new investment and a fresh presence.

“The aim is to take on, or at least provide a vigorously independent alternative to, the local News Limited monopoly.”

As they say, watch this space.

Peter Coleman