An online newspaper that is also called a web newspaper is a daily newspaper which is published and read over the Internet. Such a daily can be an individual online publication or the web-version of a printed daily.
The internet has opened the cope for printed dailies to compete with their broadcast counter part in terms of reporting news timely. Previously you had to wait a whole day to read about an event in black and white, As generally one edition of the periodical was published each day. Online newspapers are updated several times a day, so you come to know about an event the moment it happens. The greatest advantage of online newspaper is that they do not lead to incurring huge printing cost nor do they require manual delivery. They can be accessed by their clients from the comforts of their house just with the clicks of a mouse.
Basically an online newspaper is quite similar to the hard-copy newspapers. They have to comply by the same legal boundaries, such as laws pertaining to libel, privacy and copyright. A daily newspaper contains literature of various types to suit the interests of different readers.
It contains detailed coverage of political news, sports events and information on entertainment, health and lifestyle. Most papers have separate sections dedicated to business and economics. Besides there are special pages that have editors columns, features that give subjective views of the top journalists about various events. Daily newspapers also have pages for advertisements of various types of products. They also have classified pages for jobs and many more. Sunday edition of a daily newspaper may have coupons and comics.
There are many online newspapers that are available online only. One of the oldest examples in this category is the Weekend City Press Review. This started being published in 1991. This is a weekly online newspaper that was dished out on the basis of subscription. Its content mainly comprised of summaries of the articles published in the weekends in various newspapers of UK. The Southport Reporter is also an example of online newspaper in the UK.
These days most printed newspapers have online versions. Now you can access the New York Times or the Washington Post from any quarter of the world. The gradual diminishing profit margins of the traditional newspapers have led to setting up of the online model of most local, regional or national newspapers, by stopping the printed version. . These publications have their online reporters and dont take and analyze content of other newspapers. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer is an example in this regard.