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July 7, 2010, 2:25 p.m.

Time shifts online strategy, lays first bricks of paywall

Last night we wrote about Time magazine’s removal of full-length magazine stories from its website. Readers now get an abridged version paired with a pitch for the print edition or Time’s iPad app. This raised an existential question for us: If you can’t pay for the content, but it’s behind a wall, is it fair to say that Time has erected a paywall?

That question waits for another day, since we just heard back from a Time spokesperson, Betsy Goldin. Goldin tells us in an email that “there is a plan in place for being able to purchase articles online.” So, a classic paywall. Details on payment structure TK.

Other content on Time’s site will remain free, including their new aggregation-heavy NewsFeed and its blogs. Goldin says 90 percent of the content that appears on the site is web exclusive.

Meanwhile, their iPad app, where issues are priced the same as a newsstand copy of Time at $4.99, also runs exclusive content, like videos, slideshows, and other content. It does not include the web-exclusive articles and posts. So, if you’re the sort of person who wants everything Time has to offer, you’ll have to go at least two places.

POSTED     July 7, 2010, 2:25 p.m.
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Lessons learned in The Building of Lost Causes
“The skills we developed while facing down the fossil fuel industry — persistence through trolling campaigns, converting readers one by one, turning an upstart publication into essential reading — these aren’t just about journalism. They’re about how to keep building when everything around you feels like it’s crumbling.”
Blocking out the audience’s siren song
“But most governance — even extreme governance — is banal. If Project 2025 is anything to go by, journalists need to focus more on the boring minutiae of policymaking and not on the sensationalism of politics.”
Journalism education leads the change we seek
“Training the next generation of journalists means preparing them to be global citizens.”