So, the plans for the New York Times paywall are out. I said when they were first mooted that they looked to be thinking along the right lines in allowing people to view content for free if they came via social media – but I feared that that innovation would be lost along the way. It’s enormously encouraging to see
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I wager that after six months the News Of The World paywall will have been more successful than The Times in terms of retaining readers. (This is of course different to the more important, wider success of overall revenue). That is all. See you back here in March.
Currently running as a registration service, The Times plan to launch their paid-for site in the next few weeks. So far they are reluctant to release initial registration figures and the demographic audience they are attracting. OJB caught up with Assistant Editor and Head of Online Tom Whitwell at News:Rewired to find out more: [youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCWt1b14yx8]
If, like me, you’re a regular reader of The Guardian‘s media coverage, or you listen to their Media Talk podcast, you might have been surprised to have read the following in the February 2010 UK edition of Wired: The Guardian… hopes users of it’s £2.39 (iPhone) app will pay extra for privileged access to in-demand columnists. (p.89) This seems to
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Questions from a UCLAN student on paywalls, published here as part of my FAQ section: 1.A tabloid’s cover price barely covers the distribution costs, showing all profits are aquired through advertising: Given that The Sun & Daily Mail still sell 5million copies between them, how much do you think making companies advertise across two platforms (print and online) has damaged the
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More questions from a student that I’m publishing as part of the FAQ section: 1. If News Corp starts charging for news stories, do you think readers would pay or they would just go to different newspapers? Both, but mostly the latter. Previous experiments with paywalls saw audiences drop between 60 and 97%. And you also have to figure in that
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Statistics from the American Press Institute paint a strong picture of the disconnect between news executives and readers that covers how much content is valued by execs and readers, how easy the two camps think it is to find alternative sources of news; and where readers would go if the website was turned off. That last question shows the biggest
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Back in June I posted ‘In defence of paywalls (a thought experiment)‘ where I said: “When you’re driving a tanker and you see a big rock ahead – do you ask everyone on the ship to rebuild it as an aeroplane? Or do you start steering away in the hope that your part of the tanker will somehow avoid the
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Tonight I had the pleasure of chairing an extremely informative panel discussion on data and the future of journalism at the first London Linked Data Meetup. On the panel were: Martin Belam (Information Architect, The Guardian; blogger, Currybet) John O’Donovan (Chief Architect, BBC News Online) Dan Brickley (Friend of a Friend project; VU University, Amsterdam; SpyPixel Ltd; ex-W3C) Leigh Dodds (Talis) What
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