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Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Fri May 10, 2013 12:52 pm
by btenny
The Phoenix newspaper (Arizona Republic) where I live is trying to institute a pay access system for digital readers if you look at more than 19 articles per month. They are demanding a full automatic deduction be setup and monthly payments of $9.99 for on line only access. The paper is the only local regular written news for a population of 4M so they have huge circulation. But basically the paper is just the normal local town stuff and some state wide stuff but most of the original stuff is not very well researched. Then the rest of the paper is just relayed national news. Yes there is local alternative paper called the New Times that is more into sensation than news.

So do you other guys have to spend this much to get local news or do all you young guys just read Google news??? Any suggestions??

Bill

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Fri May 10, 2013 1:18 pm
by Calm Man
Bill, I established a personal policy when this started. I believe the first was the NY Times. I simply decided that there were too many things that I LIKED reading. So much so that I would end up with 50 paid subscriptions. So I decided on zero. I find I do not miss what I no longer read as by simply looking at google news you can get pretty much anything. I know I miss some columns here or there, but that's life.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Fri May 10, 2013 1:20 pm
by Blues
Calm Man wrote:Bill, I established a personal policy when this started. I believe the first was the NY Times. I simply decided that there were too many things that I LIKED reading. So much so that I would end up with 50 paid subscriptions. So I decided on zero. I find I do not miss what I no longer read as by simply looking at google news you can get pretty much anything. I know I miss some columns here or there, but that's life.
+1

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Fri May 10, 2013 3:36 pm
by ryuns
I guess it depends how much you like the local news. It doesn't sound like you have a great alternative source. If I couldn't get news from our major paper, I'd still use the free weekly (sensational, but at least keeps you in the loop on some things). I'd also have a community-driven hyper-local news website to cover the nearby neighborhoods, and the stuff I follow on facebook to stay on top of events, etc. But I'd miss it. Even though our paper has a huge geographic spread (not quite a big as Phoenix, but big), I'd still feel a little less connected (I've exchanged emails with the restaurant critic because he's a big beer nerd, have learned about good hikes from the outdoor section, etc), which would bum me out.

By the way, you might see how the paywall shakes out. NY Times is super reliable and well-constructed without any loopholes, but ours, they don't seem to care if you read using a tablet app for free, so that's what I do.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Fri May 10, 2013 3:40 pm
by Sidney
Have paper subscription for NYT so I get digital with that for no extra cost. We have a local paper which also provides free online version but I'm not sure how long they are going to survive. You can probably cobble together national and international news with sites like Bloomberg, Reuters etc. Although it may be just a matter of time before they put paywalls up. Ultimately, print isn't going to survive except a maybe a 2-3 national dailies and then locals, many of which will be forced to weeklies due to cost. Television is no longer an option. It has been taken over by the cables which are basically editorials. The major networks are the video equivalent of tabloids,

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Fri May 10, 2013 4:50 pm
by stedix1991
ryuns wrote:By the way, you might see how the paywall shakes out. NY Times is super reliable and well-constructed without any loopholes, but ours, they don't seem to care if you read using a tablet app for free, so that's what I do.
This may be unethical but one can access NYTimes articles through the paywall by searching for the title of the article in Google and clicking the link from the results. Alternatively, if your browser has an Incognito mode such as Chrome, that mode is worth another 10 articles. I am sure there exist Firefox apps that get around this in a number of ways as well.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Fri May 10, 2013 5:52 pm
by fareastwarriors
If you value the news you are getting, then paying a little bit is not too much to ask. $10/month sounds pretty damn resonable. I love reading the paper.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Fri May 10, 2013 6:07 pm
by Toons
btenny wrote:The Phoenix newspaper (Arizona Republic) where I live is trying to institute a pay access system for digital readers if you look at more than 19 articles per month. They are demanding a full automatic deduction be setup and monthly payments of $9.99 for on line only access. The paper is the only local regular written news for a population of 4M so they have huge circulation. But basically the paper is just the normal local town stuff and some state wide stuff but most of the original stuff is not very well researched. Then the rest of the paper is just relayed national news. Yes there is local alternative paper called the New Times that is more into sensation than news.

So do you other guys have to spend this much to get local news or do all you young guys just read Google news??? Any suggestions??

Bill
Have never considered subscription plan for digital news.More than enough free access to news on the internet. :happy

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Fri May 10, 2013 6:21 pm
by jeffyscott
stedix1991 wrote:
ryuns wrote:By the way, you might see how the paywall shakes out. NY Times is super reliable and well-constructed without any loopholes, but ours, they don't seem to care if you read using a tablet app for free, so that's what I do.
This may be unethical but one can access NYTimes articles through the paywall by searching for the title of the article in Google and clicking the link from the results. Alternatively, if your browser has an Incognito mode such as Chrome, that mode is worth another 10 articles. I am sure there exist Firefox apps that get around this in a number of ways as well.
Or just delete cookies.


We still get the local paper delivered, Sunday only (though they've also added Wednesday for free). They give unlimited access on line with any paid subscription.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Fri May 10, 2013 6:25 pm
by greg24
We like having a local newspaper, so we pay $18 a month for paper delivery. If no one subscribes, there won't be a local paper for us to read online.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Fri May 10, 2013 8:05 pm
by magazinewriter
I've decided that for me it is worth paying for the New York Times. I tried going the Google route gor a few months and decided I really missed the full digital edition.

If my local paper started charging I probably would not pay. Right now I only get the Sunday edition and more often than not rely on other websites for the rest of my local news.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Fri May 10, 2013 10:38 pm
by btenny
Well the NY Times electronic version may be worth $10/ month but the Arizona Republic web site is NOT and never will be. It very seldom does any in depth reporting and quite a few stories are just poorly written with a lot of important info just missing. Plus a good 50% of the paper is direct lifts from other sources or "ad related" stories about some local bar or restraurant or decorator house. Yes it has OK local reporting of crimes and politics but it is slanted somewhat and nothing else covers the candidates and related issues at all so you have to listen. Yea and don't even get me started on the "peak hole effects" of reading a digital paper versus a big paper version...

The Republic is a small town paper that had no competition while Phoenix grew so it became a big paper. Then when they lost all the want ads revenue it got too expensive to keep a internet site and paper version going. So either I pay this price or "cheat" by using browser tricks. I am not going to pay this price or cheat so I may just not read the darn thing much anymore. Oh and yes I used to get a paper version and still enjoy that even if I hate all the black hands and ink smears. But when we travel it is too much trouble to turn it on and off so we just stopped it.

Maybe you guys are right and the big metro area regional Republic daily paper will become 4-5 town sized free weekly or twice weekly papers and associated web sites.

What is happening in Austin or Philidelphia or Miami as examples? I know Reno is trying to do this paywall thing but Sacremento is not...

Bill

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 12:12 am
by Default User BR
I'm still a dead-trees fan. I like stretching out on the couch with a real paper. I really only use online for breaking news.


Brian

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 6:33 am
by jeffyscott
I just checked what our Milwaukee paper charges and for digital only it is $4.29 per month, so yours is asking for more than double. (For our package, Sunday, Wednesday and digital it is $5.99)

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 6:48 am
by livesoft
I don't know what the answer is. I want the good journalists to make a living but it seems that the number of good journalists in the US have jobs at about 5 places. Once one it out of the top 5, we are talking about stories about cats.

I tried the discount rate for 3 months for the online NYTimes, but I found a couple of things disturbing. (1) I had to login, so they could track which articles I was reading and create a profile of me for their advertisers. Sure, they can do this even if I don't log in, but I use several computers around the world, so I might have some obscurity. (2) I was pissed that other people did not pay for the same thing. That is, the NYTimes paywall is full of holes and doesn't really work that well.

And finally,if I hit a free article limit I found that I really didn't need to read so much and became more choosy and selective in the articles that I decided to read. For news, I could just go to a free site. So I use my free article limit for unique features and not for generic news.

But in the end, the paywalls are not a digital curtain, so why pay at all? I suppose if a place like the NYTimes tried the NPR and PBS business model (ask for donations; very limited advertising), then it might survive. I just don't know.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 6:53 am
by rustymutt
Our local paper charges for this now also. I get around it by using script blocking technologies that hide my ID from the paper.
I have to be careful and post comments from a 3rd party source, but it works well, and doesn't cost me a dime. If they know who is connected, they will send annoying popups telling you how to join, and loaded with ads. No-Script, and/or Adblock does the trick for me.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 7:05 am
by tim1999
The local paper that I read now requires pay access after reading a small number of articles, along with the NY Times as others mentioned. I'm cheap, so I just use the "In Private Browsing" feature on Internet Explorer to get around this.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 7:08 am
by tim1999
btenny wrote: What is happening in Austin or Philidelphia or Miami as examples? I know Reno is trying to do this paywall thing but Sacremento is not...

Bill
The Philadelphia Inquirer (http://www.philly.com) does not have a paywall of any kind.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 7:43 am
by jon-nyc
I pay for the FT and the NYT. But then I paid for them when they were paper too.

I used to pay for the WSJ but canceled when Murdoch bought it and announced he was taking it down market. The FT is head and shoulders above it anyway. Like comparing the Economist to Time or Newsweek.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 8:30 am
by frugaltype
jeffyscott wrote:
stedix1991 wrote:
ryuns wrote:By the way, you might see how the paywall shakes out. NY Times is super reliable and well-constructed without any loopholes, but ours, they don't seem to care if you read using a tablet app for free, so that's what I do.
This may be unethical but one can access NYTimes articles through the paywall by searching for the title of the article in Google and clicking the link from the results. Alternatively, if your browser has an Incognito mode such as Chrome, that mode is worth another 10 articles. I am sure there exist Firefox apps that get around this in a number of ways as well.
Or just delete cookies.
They fixed the cookie thing, you do have to use a search. I'd pay for it, but it includes paying for smart phone apps, and I don't even have a smart phone. I have complained about that and gotten nowhere.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 8:33 am
by frugaltype
I would actually pay for the Providence Journal, but their e-edition has an unbelievably bad interface. I tried the sample and they couldn't have made it more unreadable if that had been a design goal.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 8:34 am
by aude
A lot of local libraries now offer electronic magazine and newspaper subscriptions through Zinio. Free to read on your PC or tablet. Check it out. Paid content for free!

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 9:13 am
by jeffyscott
frugaltype wrote:Or just delete cookies.
They fixed the cookie thing, you do have to use a search. I'd pay for it, but it includes paying for smart phone apps, and I don't even have a smart phone. I have complained about that and gotten nowhere.[/quote]

Does anti-spyware get rid of whatever the NY Times is using to block? I use "super antispyware" occasionally and I was assuming that, since that deletes cookies, it was the reason why I have not seen a limit recently...but maybe it's just that I don't read that many articles there.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 9:18 am
by Sheepdog
I buy two print newspapers daily (my local paper plus USA Today), plus another pay digital subscription which includes a Thursday and Sunday print and a phone app(Indianapolis Star). Why the digital package? Mainly because we get more state information, but especially Indy Colts news. We are old Colts fans.
Jim

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 10:01 am
by rjbraun
jon-nyc wrote:I pay for the FT and the NYT. But then I paid for them when they were paper too.

I used to pay for the WSJ but canceled when Murdoch bought it and announced he was taking it down market. The FT is head and shoulders above it anyway. Like comparing the Economist to Time or Newsweek.
I also like the FT; FT Weekend is especially good (for culture stuff). But I found I also kept checking out the WSJ online and I would find articles I wanted to read. Oftentimes they were specific to things related to the investment industry, perhaps more US-centric, and I feel the FT just doesn't cover that as much. So, to stay current in what is going on (in part, so I am up on what others I speak with are reading), I broke down and resubscribed to the WSJ.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 10:02 am
by rjbraun
Cherokee8215 wrote:The local paper that I read now requires pay access after reading a small number of articles, along with the NY Times as others mentioned. I'm cheap, so I just use the "In Private Browsing" feature on Internet Explorer to get around this.
Interesting idea. Are there any drawbacks to doing this? I use Safari as my browser. I assume there's a similar setting ...?

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 12:00 pm
by obgraham
I'm in a smaller city, with a local paper, the only source for local news. Since we travel a lot, we were forever starting and stopping delivery, which they usually messed up.

After a couple of false starts, they now have a working online version, which brings up a complete image of every page. Including all the car ads and funnies! At $70 a year it's cheaper than the paper version, so we have gone online exclusively, and are actually happier than when we had delivery.

So now our morning routine, wherever we are in the world is the same. Fire up the laptop, read the local rag. If I don't find my name in the obituaries, I figure it's okay to get dressed.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 12:24 pm
by jeffyscott
obgraham wrote:After a couple of false starts, they now have a working online version, which brings up a complete image of every page. Including all the car ads and funnies!
I've been assuming that all the paid versions of online newspapers include something like that where you get the entire print version electronically. Is that not the case?

Ours includes this, you get access to a complete electronic copy of the printed newspaper along with the unlimited web access. I've not made much use of that version myself...but I just took a look at today's and it seems like they also have improved the way it functions. We are paying about the same, $72 per year for us, though we get Sunday and Wednesday on dead trees, online only is about $51.50 per year.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 12:37 pm
by epilnk
I live in a largish town, and the local paper is thin and fairly low content. However I like living in the kind of town that is able to support a local paper, so we subscribe (digital and print for one price). In addition to coverage of school board debates and front page feature articles about the tree that's causing a bump in the bike path, I get to see what's happening at the local used book store, read about my son's double in the little league column, and find out what business is going in where the beauty supply store used to be. That information may or may not be "worth" the subscription price, but the paper itself is and if I don't support it, who will?

When the NYT rolled out its online subscription model I planned to pay, since it was my primary source for real news. However the rollout coincided with the elimination of several of my favorite columnists, so I decided to hold off (so as to not vote with my dollars). As it turns out, I weaned easily and don't miss it - if anything I like that I no longer see those lifestyle "trend" articles about rich people who spend far too much on superficialities.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 12:53 pm
by jebmke
obgraham wrote: If I don't find my name in the obituaries, I figure it's okay to get dressed.
Always good to check. These days, with everything in the cloud you want to make sure that YOU aren't in the cloud.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 12:58 pm
by gerrym51
i have a total of 3 browsers- chrome and chrome incognito, and internet explorer. the newspapers reads all three as different browsers.

then of course you can delete cookies from browser and start again-i don't like to do that -too much of a hassle having to log in everywhere again.

if desperate add somemore browsers

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 2:00 pm
by poundwise
Over half the nations top 20 newspapers have paywalls, and many community newspapers are following suit too: http://paidcontent.org/2013/04/03/a-maj ... fographic/ Since an ad-based model has not kept newspapers in the black, this is perhaps the only model that will allow them to survive in the future.

My personal choice is to happily pay for a NYT digital subscription (which BTW, covers two people), as well as for a digital subscription to my local paper. I can afford it, I enjoy the content, and I want to see these entities survive.

Yes, you can read every NYT article free by Googling titles and linking back in. This is an undesired side-effect of an intentional policy: NYT wants users to be able to search for news and share articles so that the paper has reach. Readers who use this loophole are probably less likely to pay anyway, so it is not a huge loss. The NYT paywall targets the most dedicated users who want to be able to browse on their iPad, for example, without this annoyance. Classic price discrimination for the digital age.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 2:12 pm
by btenny
Interesting that the Republic is trying to charge so much versus other local papers. That seems to me they don't understand elastic pricing models. Oh well but not surprising versus the average quality of the rest of the paper. While I agree everyone including me should support thier local papers and merchants. But when they overcharge do you still support them???

I guess I will do the blocking things or the Google thing for a while as a work around and see if the price goes down.
Thanks all.
Bill.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 2:28 pm
by jebmke
gerrym51 wrote:-too much of a hassle having to log in everywhere again.
just delete the cookies for that one site.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 2:56 pm
by gerrym51
jebmke wrote:
gerrym51 wrote:-too much of a hassle having to log in everywhere again.
just delete the cookies for that one site.

i know how to clean chrome browser of cookies. i do not know how to prevent cookies at 1 site. please inform me -thanks

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 3:23 pm
by jebmke
gerrym51 wrote:
jebmke wrote:
gerrym51 wrote:-too much of a hassle having to log in everywhere again.
just delete the cookies for that one site.

i know how to clean chrome browser of cookies. i do not know how to prevent cookies at 1 site. please inform me -thanks
Deleting and preventing are two different things. I suspect that you would not be able to do anything if you set the brower to deny cookies for the site. But once the cookies are there, most browsers allow you to delete them on a case by case basis. I'm not familiar with Chrome but in Firefox, you go to

Tools>Options>Privacy and click the "Show Cookies" button. Then scroll down to the web site that you want to delete and selectively delete the cookies you want to delete for that site only.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 4:53 pm
by jeffyscott
gerrym51 wrote:
jebmke wrote:
gerrym51 wrote:-too much of a hassle having to log in everywhere again.
just delete the cookies for that one site.

i know how to clean chrome browser of cookies. i do not know how to prevent cookies at 1 site. please inform me -thanks
The anti-spyware scan I use lets you deselect any items you want to retain using a checkbox, and then click to delete the rest. I have not bothered doing that as it seems too tedious.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sat May 11, 2013 4:57 pm
by jebmke
For most sites (that need a cookie to function) I only allow the browser to set a cookie for that session. The browser flushes these when it is closed.

Re: Pay Digital Subscription Newspapers

Posted: Sun May 12, 2013 7:40 am
by abuss368
I still prefer a real old fashioned newspaper.

Thank you Warren Buffett for doing your best to keep newspapers alive.