Comments on: Please pay us for our news — please?

By: Aircanart

Aircanart — Mon, 04 May 2009 22:27:39 +0000

Not one mention of media bias. Yep! It’s all IT’s fault. Good grief.

By: GenevaLunch » Blog Archive » The bank ate my newspaper

GenevaLunch » Blog Archive » The bank ate my newspaper — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 13:54:42 +0000

[...] A question that keeps cropping up, given the number of failing newspapers and a 16.6 percent decline in ad revenue for US papers in 2008, is the issue of free online news and how media can cover the cost of producing it. In February a Time Magazine article by a former managing editor argued that readers should be willing to pay and not continue to expect free news online. That prompted heated rebuttals from several writers, including Internet watcher Stow Boyd and Matthew Ingram at the Nieman Journalism Lab. [...]

By: Aim the gun the right way « BuzzMachine

Aim the gun the right way « BuzzMachine — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 19:23:27 +0000

[...] that there is some way that we can charge users for content just because we’ve always done it (we haven’t). And folks like me, who are convinced that the internet is such a fundamental shift to the economy [...]

By: You can’t make abundancy scarce | byJoeyBaker

You can’t make abundancy scarce | byJoeyBaker — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 05:50:15 +0000

[...] there is some way that we can charge users for content just because we’ve always done it (we haven’t). And folks like me, who are convinced that the internet is such a fundamental shift to the economy [...]

By: Fear of Free | Dear Author: Romance Novel Reviews, Industry News, and Commentary

Sun, 22 Feb 2009 10:00:47 +0000

[...] content providers must realize is that a changing business model wherein revenues are no longer captured in the same way does not mean that content is not without value or that people will not pay, in [...]

By: Printed Matters » Paywall madness: Dec. 2008 - Feb. 2009

Printed Matters » Paywall madness: Dec. 2008 - Feb. 2009 — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 15:58:04 +0000

[...] 05, 2009 – 10:25 pm Please pay us for our news — please? by Mathew [...]

By: TroyE

TroyE — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 19:31:26 +0000

It surprises me that newspapers can’t charge as much for online advertising even though newspaper websites have higher readership. Either online advertising is ineffective or advertisers refuse to adopt the technology.

Michael Ingram’s third paragraph says it all. Advertising always has paid for the news. Advertisers will determine the fate of online newspapers. I would like to hear from advertisers why they aren’t buying online ads. Once they do, this issue is moot. Newspapers then will deliver news – and ads – instantly and effeciently on the web.

By: MichaelJ

MichaelJ — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 18:33:37 +0000

Tory,

It’s because the amount you can charge for a web ad is so much less than you can charge for print ad that it doesn’t make enough money to support an outfit, unless the company has a very, very low overhead.

By: TroyE

TroyE — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 17:24:17 +0000

The internet is a cheap, efficient way to deliver the news. Why hasn’t advertising followed newspapers to the web? That’s what’s holding up this whole transition. Online newspapers wouldn’t need as much advertising because you wouldn’t have any printing or delivery costs.

By: MichaelJ

MichaelJ — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 16:41:43 +0000

Andrew,
I think a much better approach would be to use the web to identify tribes that are interested in particular kinds of articles or features. Use analytics you will be soon be able to figure out their neighborhoods.

Then produce versioned newspapers to deliver to those neighborhoods articles about things that you already know people care about.

Then make the money by selling Local business and no profits (hospitals, day care centers, etc) that are close to those neighborhoods.

Walling off content on the net is just not possible. There are not enough people who will pay to get through.

By: Mathew Ingram

Mathew Ingram — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 16:16:26 +0000

Thanks for the comment, Andrew. That doesn’t just sound crazy on the surface — it sounds crazy all the way through :-)

I just don’t think that’s going to work, and on top of that I think it’s a head-in-the-sand kind of approach, or an attempt to turn back the clock. That ship has sailed (okay, I’m out of trite analogies now).

By: andrew

andrew — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 15:51:28 +0000

Matthew,
I’m at at a mid-sized paper in Canada. We have been wondering about something that, on the surface, sounds totally crazy: What if every news operation, small, medium, large, got together and decided to put up pay firewalls at the same time, same day etc? I understand it would be a logistical nightmare (converting sites to flash so they couldn’t be copy and pasted etc.) but as a theory, is it even remotely workable?

By: LINKS | Newspapers don’t need micropayments | byJoeyBaker

LINKS | Newspapers don’t need micropayments | byJoeyBaker — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 22:40:41 +0000

[...] Please pay us for our news – please? Nieman Journalism Lab Pushing to the Future of Journalism: Sums up the argument for and against the paid content model and concludes that users never really paid for content anyway, and that newspapers must add some value to the news to be … valued. [...]

By: What’s missing from the debate over paying for the news « Ink-Drained Kvetch

Wed, 11 Feb 2009 18:57:36 +0000

[...] at all, except in passing. As the new media sages continue to club “printies” over the head with suggestions about paying for content, either in print or online — and this has been [...]

By: Proponen cerrar los sitios de noticias por una semana « tejiendo redes

Proponen cerrar los sitios de noticias por una semana « tejiendo redes — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 03:28:18 +0000

[...] “What newspapers need to do is find ways of creating content that is more valuable than the pe…. Vía [...]