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The New York Times has (See FT 17th March 11) announced details of the charging regime for its online content. I believe that the media sector is facing the same upheavals as those that faced the music industry after switch from physical to digital with the launch of MP3 players/iPods. How newspapers change their revenue models is pretty important for anyone who values good journalism and can’t face a world dominated by free aggregators like Google and the Huffingham Post. It’s also important for us at TechMarketView. The model I launched with HotNews back in 1995 has done us proud, through several incarnations, since. This model is now referred to ‘Freemium’ – ie you give away bits for free whilst putting the meaty stuff behind the paywall. (See my Feb 11 post – Paywalls) Our model has been copied, with some success, by the Financial Times and the Wall Street Journal – although they are unlikely to acknowledge our leadership!
Conversely, News Corp, via The Times, has put everything behind the paywall – which I think is wrong. They have lost over 90% of their online readership in the process and the influence of The Times journalists has been reduced as we (and nobody else) can hyperlink to their stories.
The New York Times seems to have learnt from the others. You get access to 20 articles a month free and, indeed, if you followed a link from HotViews to the NYT it wouldn’t count in your limit. (Interestingly, a link from Google or HuffPo would…) Just like the FT, those who subscribe to the print version get the online version free. Otherwise it costs $15-$35 a month depending on the version you sign up for.
Although I really like the model, it will be interesting to see how it succeeds. The FT and WSJ (and TechMarketView) have serious business-oriented stuff behind the paywall. Most subscriptions are corporate or ‘on expenses’. But the NYT is pure news/features. Indeed the kind of stuff which, for 15 years, we have expected to get free. Indeed, in the UK access to the Telegraph, Guardian, Independent, Evening Standard etc are all still free. So all eyes on the NYT to see if 'the man in the street' will dip into his own pocket to pay for online content.
