Techdirt has an interesting post about newspapers facing the dilemma of free online content vs. paid subscribers. This comes on top of the recent announcements that PC Magazine and the Christian Science Monitor will end paper publications and move entirely to web based publishing. Changes in the newspaper industry have been dramatic, with declining subscriber rolls and declining ad revenue taking their toll, similar announcements can be expected from other major publications.
I've been keeping up with this issue because I'm a big consumer of news, but it's been quite some time since I subscribed to a traditional newspaper. For me it wasn't so much the cost of a subscription, it was the convenience of online news vs. the tendency of my printed newspapers to stack up until I had a chance to read them. They took up physical space and I felt like I couldn't throw them away until I read them. With news on the internet it's always fresh, you can easily browse archives at your convenience, and it takes up no space.
So, what could a newspaper do to win me back? I think newspapers need to work with the trends, not against them. Basic news should be free, but they can build a revenue model around charging for added services and features. For example, I can get the news from the online version of The New York Times for free, but if they could send me the entire days paper to my e-mail as a PDF or some other easily readable format (to read on a computer, cell, or PDA), I'd be happy to pay around $25 a year for that service. Similarly, if they would allow subscribers to customize the paper, favor some sections and even omit others entirely, I'd be willing to pay for that. And why not sell the days paper on iTunes or Amazon as an e-text? These are examples of how newspapers can work with subscribers to provide features and services that are worth purchasing, even as news as a commodity with infinite supply is necessarily priced at free.
Update: 2/8/09
Time Magazine has a cover story this week on How To Save Your Newspaper, but it doesn't mention the online sales ideas I mentioned, focusing instead on the idea of micropayments. I'm disappointed. I think giving away the news for free but also giving pay subscribers (both paper and electronic) more in-depth content and special services (more for the money) would be a better good way to go than turning to micropayment systems that haven't been proven yet in the hopes that people will pay ten cents for a news report.
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