Times of Zambia e-Paper: Read All About It!

Tired of having to slow down on the road as a newspaper agent chases your car, only to get him finally at level with your window and he says he has no change, leaving you slightly frustrated trying to pick up pace the as you look for the next newspaper agent?

Or maybe your nearest store never has the newspaper you’re looking for. Also frustrating right?

These is the technology era and it wouldn’t make sense not to have e-paper so the Times of Zambia put ink to paper (no pun intended) and signed a deal with MTN Zambia that allows customers to pay for their recently created Times e-paper using MTN Mobile Money.

Now we wrote about how MTN had undergone a recent upgrade of their Mobile Money platform in order to increase their value added services (VAS) just last weekend so it’s good to see them on-board such opportunities.

The Times e-paper can be accessed at www.timesepaper.com but don’t forget the ‘e’ between the ‘times’ and ‘paper’ in the URL like I did which took me to some other website that was up for sale.

So anyway, when you visit the site, it gives you an option to sign in or register if you’re a new client and you can then buy your paper. Payments are done via Visa, MasterCard and MTN Mobile Money. Hopefully, there’ll be more payment options soon.

The Times e-paper version has the same stories as the hardcopy paper and even includes advertisements and editorials as well. The best part is you get it a few hours before the hardcopy is released to the public.

It’s perfect if you’re abroad as you’ll always know what’s going on in Zambia. It’s also a good way to track stories as you can browse through old copies electronically, rather than physically go through them in the pile of newspapers you keep.

According to the Times Of Zambia itself, Times Acting Managing Director Chishimba Chishimba said ‘the Times of Zambia and Sunday Times were undergoing a process of re-designing to make them more attractive and at the same time the introduction of e-times would help improve performance amidst tight competition in the media industry.

Mr Chishimba said ‘more innovations had been lined-up to change the image of the two newspapers and increase the revenue base.’

“We will not sit idle, the industry is highly competitive but through hard work, commitment, we will be able to continue improving and give the market an improved product,” he said.

Talk about reading made accessible. You now have no excuse to not have a copy of a newspaper, whether hardcopy or on your gadget. The ‘Times’ are changing.

Maybe an app soon? No?