Why Paywalls Are Good, But NYT's Is Flawed 256
GMGruman writes "The New York Times has taken a lot of heat for daring to start charging for its product. (What nerve! Imagine if grocery stores, phone companies, or even employees began charging for their wares!) But the problem, InfoWorld columnist Galen Gruman argues, is that its paywall is poorly designed. It encourages unpaid usage in massive quantities via Twitter and other feeds, undermining its very purpose, and it makes multiple-device mobile users — the growing population — pay more than anyone else. Both should be fixed. But the more troubling underlying issue is that the Internet has devalued content nearly to the point where the business reason to create it is disappearing. In mobile, there's a chance to fix that, but in the way is not just the Web's free-loader mentality but the pricing of carriers for data transport that take a larger chunk out of people's budgets than they should, making it that much harder for people to pony up for the value of the content they get through those carriers' pipes."
Hey check out this article... (Score:4, Interesting)
content production reasons declining? (Score:5, Interesting)
I think blogs, and even facebook itself demonstrate very well that there will always be some content out there.
The major news sites just have to revamp, and stop being centers for advertising but centers for content and the people will come back. when a 5 page web article only has 2 pages of actual content you have a serious problem in your layout designs.
Besides paywalls are only good for only letting the people in who want to know your opinions. The rest of us know your opinions are just that and would prefer facts.
Right Price (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:devalued content (Score:4, Interesting)
You read things like "Tokyo's drinking water is 10,000 times above normal radiation levels". Then you look into the numbers and see that the amount is so tiny, you'd have to drink yourself to death just to get a radioactive blip.
I say fuck em... It is not a pay wall. It is a wall to protect me from them.
If you have any data / news for the surrounding lands of the Fukushima power plant please let me know.
How much is it worth? (Score:4, Interesting)
What I can't understand is if the mobile version and web version still have ads, and the printing costs are eliminated, and distribution costs are all but eliminated, why they need to choose the $180 price point a year instead of the $99 price point. I can see $200 on the iPad, with more limited ads.
It is the nature of an enterprise to try to maximize profit. The NYT, and The Daily, and WSJ, all are trying to maximize the value of a product. However, I can see publications like HufPo, using the overestimation of value of the other rags as an opportunity to put them out of business. I have no ill will for the NYT, I have subscribed to the digital editions when they were more reasonably priced. I think they will find few customers at this price point.
Re:Hey check out this article... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:devalued content vs mediocre content (Score:4, Interesting)
I'd vaguely consider paying for really really good news and analysis -
But we need a heavily honest rating service that rates the content as useful.
A 7 page Economist article might get a 9 out of 10, while the ehow SEO'd stuff would be a 2.
Google is just starting to move in this direction re: their recent backlash against "content farms".
Re:devalued content (Score:4, Interesting)
Most likely what podunk news will become is this:
a: is the uncensored official record from the town clerk searchable and indexed well. All the official statements and speeches and everything on the record.
b: an official summary by the mayor, firechief, police chief, etc... or their appointed press people.
c: blogger / critics. The guy who lost for mayor but goes to all the town council meetings, along with good disucssion.
Now I ask you doesn't that sound a heck of a lot more informative than the podunk local newspaper.
Re:devalued content (Score:4, Interesting)
News and journalism works in free-markets like everything else
But you do not want them to:
Journalists, editors, publishers, all are individuals who do potentially rough work (not in every case, but in some) that serves broader society in a way that is both practically relevant and creatively compelling. They deserve to be compensated
A free market system does not pay what is deserved, it pays for what there is demand.
At the moment there demand is falling as consumers switch to free alternatives.
People are quite happy to pay if the product is worth it: the Financial Times, The Economist, The New Scientist etc. have no problem getting people to pay because they have content that does not have a suitable free alternative, because they actually have a high quality product that is hard replace.
Most newspapers do little investigative journalism, and largely reproduce press releases, government announcements, and whatever else they are fed. The net lets us bypass them and read the original.