Increasing subscription revenues will free some of our best national media from dependence on mass audience advertising. But at what cost?
For decades, media critics have lamented American journalism’s over-reliance on advertising and pointed to Europe’s reader-funded press as the better alternative. Less than a decade ago, American newspapers on average depended on advertising for more than 80 percent of their revenues. Since then, many newspapers have moved closer to a 50-50 proposition, and The New York Times now earns more than 60 percent of its revenues from subscriptions. In early December, the Times doubled-down on this approach by reducing the number of monthly free articles available to non-subscribers from 10 to 5.
The upside of the subscription model is that readers are only going to shell out money for something they really want or need. This puts a premium on the highest quality journalism. Indeed, some of the world’s best commercial media are audience rather than advertiser supported. For example, in France, 130,000 monthly subscribers are the sole support for Mediapart’s outstanding investigative reporting.
The downside is that readers who pay premium prices may also come to equate quality journalism with news that reinforces their deeply held beliefs, creating pressures for a news organization to hew to a consistent political line — likely liberal, given the partisan leanings of most heavy news consumers.
Another downside is that subscriber-oriented news caters to high-income, high-education elites. As paywalls get firmer, total audiences may decline. It’s quality news, but not for everyone. Given their current funding guidelines, foundations are part of the same problem, not the antidote.
We should not be surprised that the majority of Americans left outside of this supposedly virtuous circle will come to feel even more alienated and distrustful of media that exclude them.
Meanwhile, while liberal media draw their circles ever tighter around themselves, conservatives are fighting to extend their mass reach: Witness Rupert Murdoch’s push to create advertising networks that will challenge those of Facebook and Google, or Sinclair’s takeover of local television news — still the major news source for most Americans.
What’s missing in the U.S. is what always exists alongside Western Europe’s reader-supported press: taxpayer-supported public service broadcasting — think BBC in England, ARD in Germany, or SVT in Sweden. Large-scale public media ensure that every citizen is exposed to high quality media content, raising the overall level of public knowledge. America’s underfunded and politically pressured PBS and NPR are simply not up to the job.
In short: The only way to avoid the democratic death spiral I’ve described above is to give up the illusion that there is a purely commercial solution to American journalism’s civic crisis.
Rodney Benson is professor of media, culture, and communication at New York University.
Raney Aronson-Rath Transparency is the antidote to fake news
Valérie Bélair-Gagnon Seeking trust in fragmented spaces
Amy King Let’s amplify visual voice
Jassim Ahmad Thriving on change
Charo Henríquez Training is an investment, not an expense
Kinsey Wilson Facebook and Google: Help out or pay up
Craig Newmark Working together toward sustainable solutions
Kim Fox Audience teams diversify their approach
Richard J. Tofel The platforms’ power demands more reporters’ attention
Aron Pilhofer We can’t leave the business to the business side any more
Joyce Barnathan It will be harder to bury the news
Vanessa K. DeLuca Women’s voices take center stage
Will Sommer The year local media gets conservative
Sara M. Watson Feeds will open up to new user-determined filters
Michael Kuntz The only pivot that might work
An Xiao Mina Memes and visuals come to the fore
Pete Brown Push alerts, personalized
Pablo Boczkowski The rise of skeptical reading
Steve Grove The midterms are an opportunity
Eric Nuzum Beyond the narrative arc
Tanzina Vega It’s time for media companies to #PassTheMic
Raju Narisetti Mirror, mirror on the wall
Amy Webb Listen to weak signals
Yvonne Leow The rise of video messaging
Cory Haik Suffering from realness, pivoting to impact
Nicholas Quah Stop talking trash about young people
Manoush Zomorodi Self-help as a publishing strategy
Tanya Cordrey Finally, the seeds of radical reinvention
Andrew Haeg The year journalists become relationship builders
Andrew Losowsky The year of resilience
Dheerja Kaur Fun with subscription products
Betsy O'Donovan and Melody Kramer Skepticism and narcissism
Frédéric Filloux External forces
Hannah Cassius The year of the echo-chamber escapists
Edward Roussel Eyes, ears, and brains
Alan Soon The rise of start of psychographic, micro-targeted media
David Skok Finding an information-life balance
C.W. Anderson The social media apocalypse
Umbreen Bhatti The trust problem isn’t new
Zizi Papacharissi Women come back
Tamar Charney We get serious about algorithms
P. Kim Bui The reckoning is only beginning
Matt Carlson Attacks on the press will get worse
Pia Frey Address users as individuals
Carlos Martínez de la Serna The new journalism commons
Debra Adams Simmons And a woman shall lead them
Kristen Muller The year of the voter
Ruth Palmer Risks will grow for news subjects — especially minorities
Alastair Coote The year of self-improvement
Andrew Ramsammy The year ownership mattered
Jennifer Choi Standing up for us and for each other
José Zamora Revenue-first journalism
Basile Simon We need better career paths for news nerds
Mariano Blejman News games rule
Kathleen McElroy Building a news video experience native to mobile
Sally Lehrman Trust comes first
Matt Boggie The intellectual equivalent of the Dead Sea
Lanre Akinola Making noise is not a strategy
Rodney Gibbs Tech workers turn to journalism
Rodney Benson Better, less read, and less trusted
Julia B. Chan Looking for loyalty in all the right places
Amie Ferris-Rotman More female reporters abroad (please)
Corey Johnson The pro-fact resistance
Carrie Brown-Smith Transparency finally takes off
Laura E. Davis Writing answers before you know the question
Jamie Mottram From pageviews to t-shirts
Lam Thuy Vo Breaking free from the tyranny of the loudest
Dan Shanoff You down with OTT? (Yeah, DTC)
Jared Newman Venture funding and digital news don’t mix
Taylor Lorenz Social and media will split
Caitlin Thompson Podcasting models mature and diversify
Claire Wardle Disinformation gets worse
Niketa Patel Live journalism comes of age
Mariana Moura Santos Think local, act global
Tim Carmody Watch out for Spotify
Adam Thomas Sharing is caring: The year of the mentor
Matt Thompson Here come the attention managers
Nushin Rashidian Publishers seek ad dollar alternatives
Mandy Velez texting is lit rn, fam
Jim Brady With the people, not just of the people
Trushar Barot The Jio-fication of India
Mike Caulfield Refactoring media literacy for the networked age
Eric Ulken The year local publishers get smart(er) about change
Nicholas Diakopoulos Fortifying social media from automated inauthenticity
Julia Beizer A longer view on the pivot
Juliette De Maeyer A responsible press criticism
Tracie Powell The muting of underserved voices
Jarrod Dicker Honesty in advertising
Helen Havlak Keywords, not publishers, power the world’s biggest feeds
Alexios Mantzarlis Moving fake news research out of the lab
Marcela Donini and Thiago Herdy Collaboration is the way forward for Brazilian journalism
Rasmus Kleis Nielsen The Snapchat scenario and the risk of more closed platforms
Dannagal G. Young Stop covering politics as a game
Emily Goligoski Looking beyond news for inspiration
Rachel Davis Mersey AI, with real smarts
Sam Ford The year of investing in processes
Jim Moroney Newspapers have to be good enough for readers to pay for
Vivian Schiller Pivot to tomorrow
Renée Kaplan The year of quiet adjustments (shhh)
Doris Truong Computer vision vs. the Internet vigilantes
Errin Haines At the ballot, it’s time to count black women
Jennifer Coogan The future is female
Jacqui Cheng Retailers move into content
Joanne McNeil Gatekeeping the gatekeepers
Cindy Royal Your journalism curriculum is obsolete
Feli Sánchez The year for guerrilla user research
Hossein Derakhshan Television has won
Caitria O'Neill The new court of public opinion
Monique Judge Letting black women tell their own stories
Imaeyen Ibanga Longform video leads the way
Matt DeRienzo A recession, then a collapse
Heather Bryant Building the ecosystems for collaboration
Monika Bauerlein The firehose of falsehood
Susie Banikarim R.I.P. Pivot to Video (2017–2017)
Michelle Ferrier The year of the great reckoning
Felix Salmon Covering bitcoin while owning bitcoin
Christopher Meighan Passive partnership is in the rearview
Mi-Ai Parrish Blockchain and trust
Brian Lam Sketchy ethics around product reviews
Miguel Castro The arrival of the impact producer
Lucas Graves From algorithms to institutions
Sydette Harry Listen to your corner and watch for the hook
Borja Echevarría TV goes digital, digital goes TV
Michelle Garcia Navigating journalistic transparency
Joanne Lipman Journalists inventing revenue streams
Jesse Holcomb Information disorder, coming to a congressional district near you
Emma Carew Grovum Newsroom culture becomes a priority
Luke O'Neil The end is already here
Cristina Wilson The year of the Instagram Story
Juleyka Lantigua-Williams Women of color will reclaim and monetize our time
Justin Kosslyn The year journalists become digital security experts
Rachel Schallom Better design helps differentiate opinion and news
Daniel Trielli The rich get richer, the poor scramble
Ståle Grut Reclaiming audience interaction from social networks
Rubina Madan Fillion Unlocking the potential of AI
Ernst-Jan Pfauth Publishing less to give readers more
Damon Krukowski Reviving the alt-weekly soul
Jessica Parker Gilbert Design connects storytelling and strategy
Millie Tran and Stine Bauer Dahlberg (Hint: It’s about your brand)
L. Gordon Crovitz Serving readers over advertisers
Marie Gilot No assholes allowed
Evie Nagy Pivot to mobile video frustration
Elizabeth Jensen Show your work
Alfred Hermida Going beyond mobile-first
Kawandeep Virdee Zines had it right all along
Mario García Storytelling finally adapts to mobile
Alice Antheaume Are you fluent in AI?
Rick Berke Value is the watchword
Sarah Marshall Loyalty as the key performance indicator
Mary Meehan Real lives are at stake in rural areas
S. Mitra Kalita The arc of news and audience
Federica Cherubini The rise of bridge roles in news organizations
Sam Sanders Shine the light on ourselves
Kyle Ellis Let’s build our way out of this
Jennifer Brandel and Mónica Guzmán The editorial meeting of the future
Francesco Marconi The year of machine-to-machine journalism
Corey Ford The empire strikes back
Nikki Usher The year of The Washington Post
Molly de Aguiar Good journalism won’t be enough