Comments on: Tick, tick, tick

By: Dorothy Poon.com » Blog Archive » Some News-centric Sentiments…

Dorothy Poon.com » Blog Archive » Some News-centric Sentiments… — Thu, 21 May 2009 14:35:30 +0000

[...] most pointed sentence from this response that jumps out at me is the fact that they are, ‘penalizing’ those who are [...]

By: Lisa

Lisa — Tue, 19 May 2009 20:58:15 +0000

the NYT already has a login. If you read it often, you won’t notice it because it is stored in your cookies. You will notice it if you clear your cache or move to another computer.

Did any of you happen to read all the NYT user comments to their last column on paying for content? Many commenters–and hundreds and hundreds of readers who read–said they’d be willing to pay a monthly or annual subscription for the access they have to NYT content. If you have premium or unique content, then why not? Works well for hyper-local, where there are few competitors. Works for WSJ. Why not NYT?

By: Nick Oliva

Nick Oliva — Tue, 19 May 2009 19:32:14 +0000

There’s room for a constructive solution – even if it’s a bit elusive. When the NYT rolled out their TimesSelect (I think it was called) I signed up and paid right away. They’ve discontinued it, I assume because it wasn’t hugely successful… but it’s not unreasonable to think it could have picked up speed eventually.

There is a reality that many ignore: I WANT to pay for my NY Times content. I don’t want to be a free rider. Give me a badge I can post on social networks that says “Dood actually pays for his NYT” or something to that effect… WAIT… ignore that… There’s a creative solution to this problem of people like me wanting to pay for what they perceive as amazingly valuable content.

Bring back TimesSelect and let journalists that are active on social media sites “encourage” their followers to pay. Offer a flat rate, please… I don’t want to have to make the purchase decision over and over and over again.

By: Micropayments and Unintended Consequences: See LUN in Santiago, Chile | Sips from the Firehose

Mon, 18 May 2009 18:44:49 +0000

[...] Weblog, the debate over charging for online content has attracted comment from industry experts Jeff Jarvis and Rob Curley, as well as Agustin Edwards, the editor/managing director of LUN, speaking at the [...]

By: Uncle Bernie

Uncle Bernie — Mon, 18 May 2009 16:52:57 +0000

who reads those far left scum anyway?

By: Joe

Joe — Mon, 18 May 2009 15:52:27 +0000

Since when did quality journalism exist in ‘unlimited
quantities’? I would argue there is a greater shortage of
that than on ‘physical products’ like food. And the only way
to get people to keep producing it is if they can make a
living doing in it. And the best way to do that is to charge for
it. You pay for everything else, why wouldn’t you pay for
quality intellectual property? Ridiculous.

By: Ian Betteridge

Ian Betteridge — Mon, 18 May 2009 14:39:55 +0000

It’s ironic that you champion Tom Evslin at just the time when the Internet access companies are desperate to move away from “all you can eat”, because that model isn’t sustainably profitable in the long run.

By: James H

James H — Mon, 18 May 2009 12:34:12 +0000

I browse newspaper sites (for free) to my heart’s content, so metered reading doesn’t appeal to me. But what makes sense to me is charging for some sort of premium content. What premium content? Darned if I know. I’d think it’d be something along the lines of interactive infographics, expanded topical coverage, or deep searches of a newspaper’s archives. Or even a charging system in which I get basic access (say, the first 10-15 paragraphs) for free, but I pony up for a subscription (or a one-time fee) for access to the rest of the article if it interests me.

Or even … and I’m not sure antitrust laws allow this — let me go to one site that allows me to pay a discounted rate to subscribe to multiple Web sites. Say … $15-$20 a month, and I can subscribe to up to 20-30 news outlets of my choice. A sort of clearinghouse for online publishers, if you will.

By: Tick, Tick, Tick | Jeff Jarvis | Voices | AllThingsD

Tick, Tick, Tick | Jeff Jarvis | Voices | AllThingsD — Mon, 18 May 2009 08:19:20 +0000

[...] Read the rest of this post on the original site Tagged: Internet, Voices, newspaper, BuzzMachine, Jeff Jarvis, John Koblin, New York Times, The Observer | permalink Sphere.Inline.search(“”, “http://voices.allthingsd.com/20090518/tick-tick-tick/”); « Previous Post [...]

By: Tech tjek - teknologi til folket » Blogarkiv » Grunker eller gratis? Stor uenighed om avisernes digitale fremtid

Mon, 18 May 2009 06:33:48 +0000

[...] overraskende, er Jarvis skeptisk over for avisernes aktuelle planer for [...]

By: Andy Freeman

Andy Freeman — Mon, 18 May 2009 04:19:33 +0000

> How come that most of you insist on free journalism?

We don’t.

We merely point out that we won’t pay more than the lowest cost provider.

If you’re doing commodity news, you’re probably either giving it away for your own reasons or you’re competing with someone who is giving it away. Either way….

If you’re doing not-commodity news, you can charge what the market will bear – value to your readers is the limit.

It may be possible to make money on commodity news, but the easy money is in good, unique, valuable-to-readers.

One way to figure out whether you’re delivering that is whether your readers offer to pay when you take the day off.

By: Medienlinks zum Wochenstart: Ausgepresste Zeitungen? — CARTA

Medienlinks zum Wochenstart: Ausgepresste Zeitungen? — CARTA — Sun, 17 May 2009 17:36:50 +0000

[...] Tick, tick, tick [...]

By: Linktipps zum Wochenstart (10) « Medial & Digital

Linktipps zum Wochenstart (10) « Medial & Digital — Sun, 17 May 2009 17:14:09 +0000

[...] Tick, tick, tick [...]

By: The 4 reasons anybody ever consumes information (or opinion), and what that tells us about business models | Text Technologies

Sun, 17 May 2009 09:12:18 +0000

[...] by some kind of usage metric doesn’t make sense. This seems to be what the New York Times is thinking about. It may also be what Murdoch is suggesting for some of his other [...]

By: Rob Poitras

Rob Poitras — Sat, 16 May 2009 15:44:50 +0000

Im guessing it will also require a login to monitor time on a site. That is stupid as well.

By: Martyn Allan

Martyn Allan — Sat, 16 May 2009 15:19:26 +0000

for the future, I am sure that you woud accecpt that as a minimum the economics of scarcity and the economics of abundance are both attributes are of our current reality. A recognised trait of the economics of scarcity is thhat it is amoral and such capable of produding both deisirbale and undesirbale results.
TTThere is a risk of google abusing there power at some point and the masses (whether individual agents or businesses) having little choice but to move with grain of change as google defines the parameters for those still operating in the economins of scarcity.
We all chose the words we use to create the reality around us and I think it is food for thought that google’s governing mantra is don’t be evil. The action word in this is evil. It is an interesting choice of language (whether considered at conscious level or not)
In summary, I believe that are risks associated with googles direction and as a mimimum there current dominance creates the potential for harm as well good and it this that i would you like you to dwell on.
Warm regards

By: Martyn Allan

Martyn Allan — Sat, 16 May 2009 15:12:49 +0000

Thank you Jeff. I take away a powerful message from your reply that you put your money where you mouth is with this and eat your own dog food. I’m impressed at getting a bespoke reply from you.
I can’t help feeling that you’ve not fully disected my suggestion fully though. I accept what you are saying entirely that there any many new and emerging battlegrounds to play for and previous performance is not indicative of future performance – I have a feeling that my grandkids will say ‘Microsoft who?’, but as you rightly point out google have become more than a product. More than a service. They are the platform that the web operates on. And whilst the ecomonics of abudance is a truth I ha happily accpet

By: Jeff Jarvis

Jeff Jarvis — Sat, 16 May 2009 12:44:28 +0000

Start with the Guardian thinking distributed with its api, joining the NY Times, NPR, and the BBC.
Glam started a platform and network and others, including Burda, are finally paying attention to that model.
Journalists all over — except at the WSJ, where it’s now forbidden — are treating their work as a process more than a product, issuing reporting on the blogs – as betas – to get collaborative help.
And so on….

By: Jeff Jarvis

Jeff Jarvis — Sat, 16 May 2009 12:41:23 +0000

Google has not won all wars. Social, local, and live are still up for grabs. Google does have growing hegemony in advertising but there’s nothing to stop others from competing on many fronts.

By: Martyn Allan

Martyn Allan — Sat, 16 May 2009 03:04:02 +0000

Hi Jeff,
I have a question for you. I am about 80% of the way through WWGD and something has been bothering me in what is otherwise a compelling arguement for the googilastion of everything.
It strikes me that there is an error in your thinking (and I am happy to be corrected). You omit to consider the absence of competition in a googleised world and the implications of a world wide monopoly.
Please accept my apologies if you cover this at the end of the book, but I have only just crystalised my view point and it’s been bugging me since I started reading it.
Pkease could you share your thoughts with me on the implication of a google monopoly, what would happen in the event of a change of leadership at google and speculate as you have done so in the book on some less good outcomes.
I do not have an agenda, i’m just hoping you can inform my thinking with a more balanced perspective.
TThanks.
Also, if any text is mis-spelt, it may be me or may be the fact that only part of the text box is displaying on your site.
Warm regards

By: Bradley J. Fikes

Bradley J. Fikes — Sat, 16 May 2009 02:22:47 +0000

Those who analogize physical products and intangible ones just don’t get it.

– Physical products such as food exist in finite quantities, and there is no substitute for them.

– News on the Web exists in unlimited quantities, and substitution is easy. Facts cannot be copyrighted.

– Even the self-important New York Times is far from irreplaceable. It’s prone to ghastly mistakes in anything technical, like finance. (see: http://tinyurl.com/aysf9y)

– Buyers of the dead-tree edition don’t pay for the news, they pay for the cost of distribution, which has zero marginal cost on the Web.

– Having to pay or log in on the Web IS punishment. It’s a barrier to the unhindered experience normal on the Web.

Aside from those points, great reply, Jason.

By: It’s Dumb to Charge for Some Sites, But Brilliant for Others « The Open Field

Sat, 16 May 2009 01:46:54 +0000

[...] crazy for a fabulous brand like the Times not invent something they can charge for online. But plenty of observers still regard every sign that a newspaper is going to charge for content as a pathetic move [...]

By: Mike Manitoba

Mike Manitoba — Sat, 16 May 2009 00:06:26 +0000

Do you wear a monocle and huff in an Oxford trill?

By: SD

SD — Fri, 15 May 2009 23:24:35 +0000

why not run it like a political campaign? allow bloggers to create “tip jars”, and (unlike political campaigns) offer both financial and non-financial rewards to those bloggers who raise the most money.

Rewards could include: a revenue share on money raised; unique insider access to the paper; special, early windows for editorial content (so those bloggers can get access to stories before jon q public).

The 1 catch – the names of the “donation packagers” would be made public by the newspaper … so readers would always know the relationship between the newspapers and the source of revenue … probably more readily transparent than ad relationships today.

This only works at the national level, but hey, these papers are going out of business anyway, so there wont be many papers competing anymore.

By: Solitude

Solitude — Fri, 15 May 2009 23:11:50 +0000

I insist on open journalism.
I deny the established professionals the right to be gate keepers of any sort.

The quality of their work, and their judgment has been found wanting.
I have zero interest in hearing of the latest Jon Benet Ramsey or O.J. Simpson case day after day ad nauseum while there are other stories I could be informed about.

Amateurs do a far better job of covering everything, once you learn to navigate the blogosphere.

And certainly they are not less accurate than the profession of Jason Blair, And Walter Duranty.