The Financial Times sees the publishing industry changing and are loosening the purse strings to get better acclimated to the new digital environment.  FT announced today that they will provide all 1,800 staffers with a $480 rebate toward the purchase of an iPad or other digital tablet computer.

paidContent’s Robert Andrews got a hold of FT CEO John Ridding’s company-wide memo in which he explained the rationale behind the rebate:

“We have seen rapid growth in readership on these new devices, which support and extend our ‘channel neutral’ strategy. Given their importance and the wave of innovation that we are seeing in applications and services, we want to encourage all our staff to be expert and experienced in using them.”

Andrews writes that the combined cost for all the employee rebates can reach $864,000.  Fortunately, FT should be able to foot the bill as their own iPad app hauled in nearly half a million subscribers between May and October.