Unregistered users of thetimes.co.uk are now “bounced” to a Times+ membership page where they have to register if they want to view Times content. Data from the web metrics company Experian Hitwise shows that only 25.6% of such users sign up and proceed to a Times web page; based on custom categories (created at the Guardian) that have been used to track the performance of major UK press titles online, visits to the Times site have fallen to 4.16% of UK quality press online traffic, compared with 15% before it made registration compulsory on 15 June.

These figures can then be used to model how this may impact on the number of users hitting the new Times site. Based on the last available ABCe data for Times Online readership (from February 2010), which showed that it had 1.2 million daily unique users, and Hitwise’s figures showing it had 15% of UK online newspaper traffic, that means a total of 332,800 daily users trying to visit the Times site.

Emphasis added

If I’m not mistaken, the Grauniad has taken Times ABCe figures and multiplied them with the Times’ share of national newspaper traffic (in a separate month from a different source) to derive an estimate at current daily users.

Just wrong.

UPDATE – It’s possible it is a case of bad writing, rather than bad maths. The quote above makes it appear like they have applied 15% to 1.2m to get 330k (which would be patently wrong).

It’s possible the maths works as follows: the 330k is the 15% of total UK quality print online daily readership (c.2.3m). Then 4% of 2.3m = c.80k, which in turn is <10% of the 1.2m (so a loss of more than 90% since Feb).

If that is the logic, then it is flawed for a number of reasons. Not least the mixing and matching of data sources and the assumption that readers who no longer read the Times Online read another UK national quality paper online instead.

Plus – as readers in the comments section of the original article point out – even if you lose 90% of your readership, if they are willing to pay more collectively than you got in click-through advertising making the same content available for free, then you’re better off behind a pay-wall.