NYTimes.com with the Epic Fail

[ElNono]

The Times Announces Digital Subscription Plan (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/18/business/media/18times.html?hp)

Now you get to pay to watch those annoying ads!
Already tried once and failed miserably.... so let's do it again!
/facepalm

[DMX7]

I think the front page content is still free though + 20 articles a month.

[DMX7]

That entire concept already has it's own website, it's called the Huffington Post.

[ElNono]

- There's no pricing scale, which is retarded.
- The base price is too expensive ($180/year) unless you're a big fan of the site.
- You can simply read the news everywhere else... the premium is basically OPed's
- It's not done out of necessity... they pocketed almost a billion dollars in ad revenue last year.
- It alienates everybody except the fans, and considerably reduces their ad views, which in the digital age, is what drives ad revenue.

The fact that they're trying to double-dip with ads and a paywall basically tells you they're still clawing to the old newspapers business model which is basically getting extinct as we speak.

Fortunately, this is probably going to flop fairly quickly. I'll check them out again then.

[DMX7]

Yeah, $180 per year is absurd.

What do you mean they are hanging on to the old business model though? NyTimes has been relatively cutting edge with other new media. They're strategy of free front page views will still preserve a lot of ad revenue (at least they seem to think). Although I do hope they go back to free which they did in the past when they walled off certain sections.

[LnGrrrR]

180 a year? 15 bucks a month? How much is a hard copy subscription? :lol

[Stringer_Bell]

With the wealth of FREE information out there, and IP's like ATT creating charging for byte usage, you'd think a "smart" company would understand that 1) their writers aren't worth $180 per subscriber and 2) their consumers don't need another charge to worry about.

Clearly, they must be going after the techno-philes that like to read shit on iPads and look cool at Starbucks. In that case, take their money NYTimes, those jackasses aren't spending it on anything useful anyway.

[TeyshaBlue]

I think this model actually makes sense. Subscribers to the paper get this for free since they already subscribe. Why should the content the actual subscribers pay for be offered for free on the net? To me that's never made much sense. The NYT model allows a set number of free access to anybody, and if the articles are linked from another site, anyone can read them. It's a method of assigning value not only to your content, but to your subscribers. I've got zero probs with this.

[hater]

well these ppl don't care who reads their paper as long as money comes in.

They are obviously not out to reach the masses.

[boutons_deux]

I heard on commie/hippie/hyper-liberal NPR this morning that NYTimes.com has 30 million visitors/month. If only 1% sign up for one sub, that's $54M.

btw, NPR has 30M listeners. I really hope GOP keeps trying to kill NPR. When the Dems attached an amendment to the defund-NPR bill that forbade Govt from sending money to Fox Repug Propaganda network, 100% of the Repugs voted against. :lol

Repugs really, really do take us for dumbfucks (actually, that's accurate for Repug voters).

[ElNono]

Yeah, $180 per year is absurd.

What do you mean they are hanging on to the old business model though? NyTimes has been relatively cutting edge with other new media. They're strategy of free front page views will still preserve a lot of ad revenue (at least they seem to think). Although I do hope they go back to free which they did in the past when they walled off certain sections.

The fact that they charge the same for the guy that reads 21 articles a month and the guy that reads 5/6 articles a day. With the old newspapers, you couldn't meter how many stories people read and charge accordingly, but on the digital age you can. The flat-fee reeks of the old business model.
Furthermore, with the amount they charge, you would think they'll back down a bit with the floating ads, which are much more distracting than any newspaper ad, but that's not the case. They basically want you to pay AND keep around the same ad format they currently have.

Look, they're free to try whatever they want. It's their content after all. I just think that, except for OP-eds, they really offer very minimal original content. Content which can be found elsewhere for free.

[ElNono]

I think this model actually makes sense. Subscribers to the paper get this for free since they already subscribe. Why should the content the actual subscribers pay for be offered for free on the net? To me that's never made much sense. The NYT model allows a set number of free access to anybody, and if the articles are linked from another site, anyone can read them. It's a method of assigning value not only to your content, but to your subscribers. I've got zero probs with this.

Because the net already offers the bulk of the content they provide on the newspapers to subscribers for free? Isn't that the reason newspapers and their subscriptions are dying a slow death?

[TeyshaBlue]

Because the net already offers the bulk of the content they provide on the newspapers to subscribers for free? Isn't that the reason newspapers and their subscriptions are dying a slow death?

A little yea, a little nay. There's still a fair amount of writing being done at the NYT....at least their headcount suggests it. It's the written content that the value is being ascribed to in this scenario.

[MannyIsGod]

Actually, this is fairly genius for the NYT because you'll still be able to access the site pretty much as freely as you would before due to they way they're handling links from other sites to stories.

So they'll basically get some people to pay for it and everyone will continue to see the same basic access they've had. They'll get some to pay for what everyone is going to have access for free.