"Current days of [free] internet will soon be over"

[Lurker]

Instead of each and every website having it's own subscription, I think a better way to is create a "web news passport." It would be an account that online users would place some credit into, say $20, and when you visit a website that account would be deducted from. Each website can set it's own price, from a few pennies per article to a dollar for a day's access. That way readers would not have to manage a hundred subscriptions and remember a hundred passwords. It should be centralized. Just my opinion.

 

PTR

In other words, something of a Nexis portal subscription.

[KRC]

The Professional Football Researchers Association has a similar problem, but obviously on a smaller scale. With the increase in costs to publish/deliver our magazine, we need to find a way to keep costs down and still be able to deliver the magazine. Raising dues will cost us memberships. We would not be able to generate enough ad revenue online to pay expenses. The option we are tossing out is an electronic subscription. That way, we can e-mail the magazine to anyone who has paid their dues and we save the costs of printing/postage. The incentive to go with the electronic subscription is that dues will be lower. If you still want the hard copy of the magazine, you can still get that at the normal level of dues. The hope is that we can keep from raising dues by getting enough people to switch to the electronic version of the magazine.

[Nervous Guy]

It's going to be a sad day for us "old farts" when the newspapers go away. That was one of the things I was looking forward to in retirement is spending more time with the paper.

what the hell am I going to read during my "morning constitutional"?

[Chef Jim]

what the hell am I going to read during my "morning constitutional"?

 

That is what guy wrote in his letter to the editor the the SF Chronicle. He said it's going to be hard to take his computer into the bathroom to read the sports section. I disagree. You still have a lap for your laptop in there.

 

Reminds me of when I worked in the kitchen. Whenever a waiter would bring back a dish to the kitchen (a big no-no for us chefs) because the customer was in the restroom I'd tell them "take it to him there, there's a 50/50 chance he's sitting down."

[taterhill]

That is what guy wrote in his letter to the editor the the SF Chronicle. He said it's going to be hard to take his computer into the bathroom to read the sports section. I disagree. You still have a lap for your laptop in there.

 

Reminds me of when I worked in the kitchen. Whenever a waiter would bring back a dish to the kitchen (a big no-no for us chefs) because the customer was in the restroom I'd tell them "take it to him there, there's a 50/50 chance he's sitting down."

Laptops get hot.....ouch

[Arkady Renko]

Instead of each and every website having it's own subscription, I think a better way to is create a "web news passport." It would be an account that online users would place some credit into, say $20, and when you visit a website that account would be deducted from. Each website can set it's own price, from a few pennies per article to a dollar for a day's access. That way readers would not have to manage a hundred subscriptions and remember a hundred passwords. It should be centralized. Just my opinion.

 

PTR

 

I think there would be anti-trust concerns with that model.

[Arkady Renko]

You make valid points, but I bet a lot of that changes with charging for content.

I'm not saying I agree with it, but I understand: It does have some similarity to music: If a reporter for the NY Times writes articles as a profession, and part time bloggers who blog read them and basically take bits and pieces of it and rehash it into their 'own' article, I cannot blame them if they want their piece of the pie.

 

Copyright is very fluid area of the law, but briefly quoting an article and providing links to the source of that quote is not necessarily any sort of copyright violation. Or -- to be more precise -- the violation can be defended as fair use.

 

You can certainly quote another's work and comment on it, the question is how much of it you can. I am not sure the newspapers have such an airtight copyright case against bloggers as some may seem to think. If you listened to some in the media, TBD should be paying content providers for what TBD puts on the front page of this site.

[Arkady Renko]

I think a lot of it is the culture. I read the paper every day from when I was a teenager (even earlier for sports and comics). I had college classes that required subscribing to the Journal (or to Business Week or other publications).

 

Today? I bet my sister's teenage kids have never read a paper and probably never will. It's all on the web. And IMO, that's hugely damaging to our society since (as noted above), most of the content on the web is pure crap.

 

How is the NY Times on the web any worse than what is in the printed newspaper? Would you bet that your nieces and nephews have never read newspaper articles online?

[Live&DieBillsFootball]

Good luck with trying to charge people for content that has been free until now. Where they might pick up revenue from subscribers, they will also lose a ton of advertising revenue from the much lower number of page views and ad clicks.

 

Not sure what the solution will be but it may be along the lines of learning how to put toothpaste back into the tube after its been squeezed out.

[KD in CA]

How is the NY Times on the web any worse than what is in the printed newspaper? Would you bet that your nieces and nephews have never read newspaper articles online?

 

On NYT.com or WSJ online? Probably not. Most people aren't getting news from online versions of print publications, they are getting it from CNN, Fox, Yahoo and others who indulge in lower common denominator attracting crap to keep eyeballs engaged (and which makes for a less informed populous).

 

Providers of useful content like NYT or WSJ already charge for their online services, I just think it's a big stretch to think people will do the same for most other web outlets, at least in their current format.

[Arkady Renko]

On NYT.com or WSJ online? Probably not. Most people aren't getting news from online versions of print publications, they are getting it from CNN, Fox, Yahoo and others who indulge in lower common denominator attracting crap to keep eyeballs engaged (and which makes for a less informed populous).

 

Providers of useful content like NYT or WSJ already charge for their online services, I just think it's a big stretch to think people will do the same for most other web outlets, at least in their current format.

 

NYT does not charge for anything that I can think of anymore. To be fair, my local paper mainly had sensational news stories and wire service reports when I was growing up (80s-90s). Not much different than what you see on CNN and Yahoo today.

[/dev/null]

Laptops get hot.....ouch

 

And they're not flushable

[ExiledInIllinois]

I already pay for the WSJ. I would pay for the NYTimes. Add in CNN and the Philly Inquirer and that's about all I'd pay for.

 

I pay for nothing John Adams... Can't you tell!

 

[Dan]

Good luck with trying to charge people for content that has been free until now. Where they might pick up revenue from subscribers, they will also lose a ton of advertising revenue from the much lower number of page views and ad clicks.

 

Not sure what the solution will be but it may be along the lines of learning how to put toothpaste back into the tube after its been squeezed out.

Exactly. Look at the glory days of Napster. Downloading free music was occuring at a breakneck pace. The music execs wanted it shut down because they knew they could get people to pay for the music. How's that turned out? Outside of itunes and perhaps more importantly because of the success of the iPod, I'd guess music downloads are still considerably less than when it was free.

 

So, yeah, you can charge people to read CNN or whatever. And, yeah, some people will pay. However, I'd venture a guess that CNN's overall online readership will drop dramatically and other still free sites will rise. And in the end, the people at CNN will still be wondering how they can make more money.

 

I guess, as with all things, the consumer makes a decision based upon how much they're willing to pay for something. When it's free, I'll look at anything and everything. Why not? Charge me something... anything, and suddenly I start looking at a lot less content because now I have to weigh the cost of reading the crap.

 

The problem is too many people think that nothing is worth doing unless you make money on it. And then when you make a little money, you have to figure out how to make more money, because suddenly yesterday's profit margin isn't enough.

[Sen. John Blutarsky]

On NYT.com or WSJ online? Probably not. Most people aren't getting news from online versions of print publications, they are getting it from CNN, Fox, Yahoo and others who indulge in lower common denominator attracting crap to keep eyeballs engaged (and which makes for a less informed populous).

 

Providers of useful content like NYT or WSJ already charge for their online services, I just think it's a big stretch to think people will do the same for most other web outlets, at least in their current format.

Of course, now that so many of the "Higher denominator" outlets are laying so many people off who's to say that those sites won't create a more robust news reporting department since they have already figured out how to make money (Google anyway) without actually making anything and there is an ample supply of good writers who need jobs.

 

FWIW, there are two newspapers in Philadephia that are both owned by an advertising company (Tierney). They are different flavors of crap. The reporting is just as slipshod as you'd find anywhere else and it isn't worth the paper it's printed on. I constantly run into guys at kiosks who are trying to sell me a subscription and I've had a couple give me grief when I say I don't get any papers at the house. I then respond that I've already read 3 online papers from different parts of the country that day for nothing that have breaking news included from that day. Why on Earth would I pay money for something which is at least 6-12 hours old by the time I get it when I can see a more up to date product online for nothing?

 

I agree witht he paper sunset idea. Advertisers will still want to advertise but so many decisions are still made by stodgy old farts that they won't move over to online ads until they are forced to.

[Sen. John Blutarsky]

I guess, as with all things, the consumer makes a decision based upon how much they're willing to pay for something. When it's free, I'll look at anything and everything. Why not? Charge me something... anything, and suddenly I start looking at a lot less content because now I have to weigh the cost of reading the crap.

Kind of like the difference between ESPN.com and ESPN Insider. Does Insider occasionally have things I really want to read? Yup. Does that inspire me to pay for it? Nope.

 

Newspapers as we know them are going to go away and we need to get used to the idea. I know that they used to be the primary mode of news delivery in the world but that day has passed. As soon as your town is down to one paper it usually ceases to be worthwhile. Does anyone want to argue that the Buffalo News has improved since the Courier Express went away? So if my options for getting news are reading one newspaper with the same slant all the time or watching 5 different networks and reading 5 different online sources in the same amount of time I'll take the latter. The truely great writers will all find jobs in the new medium (see also Vic Carucci) and the rest of the mediocre hacks out there will fade away (see also Jerry Sullivan).

[Chef Jim]

And they're not flushable

 

You might as well say you can't wipe your ass with them when your done either.

[thebug]

I would pay, I would just use the money I am saving by stealing evryone's wireless signals.