The new approach, referred to as the metered model, will offer users free access to a set number of articles per month and then charge users once they exceed that number.I have enjoyed browsing the New York Times; for those unfamiliar with the site, their interface is one of the most efficient and user-friendly I have encountered (go to the skimmer at this link, then navigate via the right sidebar).
Whether I will pay for access depends on the cutoff point at which the NYT sets the paywall, and whether it affects NYT affiliates such as the excellent Big Picture at Boston.com. Ezra Klein at WaPo ponders what effect the NYT move will have upon blog readers -
But what to do about blogs? Already, much of what blogs do is summarize, quote or otherwise relay information that's tucked inside a long newspaper story that busy readers don't have time to find or read. This will increase that market: A blogger with a few subscriptions can distill the information from the newspapers that readers don't have subscriptions to.Perhaps. Perhaps not. I'm not going to worry about it one way or the other.
I'm watching this with considerable interest as well. The NYT is in my newsreader, but is by no means my primary source of information. Nor do I have the same respect for it that I did before its editorial board utterly caved on the torture issue. To see it referring to "Iranian torture" but "American interrogation techniques" has affected the credibility I am willing to assign to the rest of its reporting.
ReplyDeleteSo for me, the real interest is in seeing whether this attempt to monetize the Internet will succeed or fail. My money is on the latter.