Comments on: The NYT paywall is working

By: Cimorene12

Cimorene12 — Sun, 14 Aug 2011 18:15:28 +0000

One reason that the NYT has gotten to that number of subscribers so soon is that they are offering 8 weeks for $0.99. It is irresistible to pay 13 cents a week for something as great as the NYT. Thinking that all of the subscribers are ” hugely loyal, they read loads of stories, they’re well-heeled, and advertisers will pay a premium to reach them” is an overgeneralization. They may well read loads of stories, as I do, but I know that I wouldn’t pay $200 a year to read the NYT online.

By: AreaMan

AreaMan — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 13:58:29 +0000

Instead of retyping your user-name and password, consider using LastPass:
https://lastpass.com/

Also see: http://lifehacker.com/5645162/the-interm ediate-guide-to-mastering-passwords-with -lastpass

By: BachFan

BachFan — Wed, 27 Jul 2011 02:32:54 +0000

Of course I could evade the NYT paywall easily, and read those items for free.

But I believe that giving people money encourages them, and I definitely want to encourage the NYT to continue committing real journalism. (In contrast, most so-called “news sites” these days merely repackage wire stories, instead of doing their own reporting.)

So I subscribe to the NYT, because I want the New York Times to continue operating and investigating and reporting.

By: hsvkitty

hsvkitty — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 21:08:30 +0000

Seriously, after seeing how many ways you can get by the pay “wall” I would say it isn’t working at all. You should have considered that journalists/businesses requiring news sources might easily make that 300k, but beyond that those who wouldn’t read daily aren’t going to pay.

It is curious that the NYT says it is OKthat so many are finding ways around the wall, as they have loyal followers happy to pay for content. Down the road, that sounds like a poor marketing tool that punishes the loyal viewer, unless they think they can hook more people into paying eventually.

By: DanPorter

DanPorter — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 18:43:50 +0000

Describing the paywall as ‘porous’ is putting it mildly. To view articles unobstructed, all you have to do is stop loading the page on your browser before the page is done loading. Then you can stare at an article for as long as you want.

Maybe you won’t lose your bet after all?

By: Woltmann

Woltmann — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 16:56:33 +0000

Set your sights low enough and you can accomplish anything ..

By: JPDoc

JPDoc — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 16:01:29 +0000

Add ?ref=fb to the base link of any NYT article and the paywall drops, and Felix thinks this is “working”? Huh?

By: jayackroyd

jayackroyd — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 13:34:12 +0000

BTW, Felix, if you call them up (hat tip, Tim Noahn at Slate) and threaten to cancel, or go to just Sundays, they’ll halve the dead tree rate.

Also been a dead tree subscriber for a very long time.

By: RZ0

RZ0 — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 11:28:45 +0000

My subscription was sponsored by Lincoln, and I’ve had no annoying access/password problems like you describe. It’s pretty clear that the Lincoln subscribers are regular users who make well above the national median (or at least did before they got laid off).
Newsjunkie, NYT is far more interested in wealthy older readers who will pay rather than figure out how to wriggle through the paywall. Advertisers prefer the latter as well.
I still believe the Times would maximize revenues by charging $5 or $10 a year for a hard paywall, because I think they would get far more than 2.5 million subscribers worldwide. However, the current setup fulfills an agenda-setting function that the Times sees as part of its mission.

By: newsjunkie247

newsjunkie247 — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 06:43:33 +0000

I would argue that the most loyal NYT readers, the ones who really want to read the paper, are the ones who will put in the effort to get around the paywall, rather than those who just see a pop-up window and lazily think they have to pay. I’ve read close to 3000 articles online the past month, but all I pay are the occasional $2 to read print edition on the subway.

By: newsjunkie247

newsjunkie247 — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 06:27:58 +0000

The people who they aren’t getting to pay are young people, and tech savvy people who know how to get around a paywall. But shouldn’t these be the people advertisers should pay a premium to reach, rather than older, less techsavvy people who are paying money even though they really don’t have to?

By: newsjunkie247

newsjunkie247 — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 06:25:59 +0000

After seeing this video I wouldn’t be so sure
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5R4CgDwF XQ
As was written on Techdirt, the “The Greatest Trick The NYTimes Ever Pulled Was Convincing The World Its Paywall Exists”. I think the fact people pay speaks more to an advertising that promotes the existence of a paywall and people’s average techno-illiteracy/laziness about how to change a link address in their browser than anything else.