3 ms·

Salvation (for Newspapers) Is at Hand - NYTimes Paywall

13 points by unignorant 17y ago

furyg3 17y ago
So... they're trusting information provided by the user's browser (referral links, cookies, javascript... whatever) to determine whether or not the article should be displayed to the user.... This makes me want to pat the NYT on the head and tell them how adorable they are. The fact that they're 1+ years away from implementing this may indicate that they have some knowledge about how technologically stupid this idea is, but are hoping that investors don't figure that out.
- kgrin 17y ago
  On the other hand, I'm not sure how much they care if they don't get to monetize the audience of people technical enough to forge a referrer (or even use an extension that does it for you). I suspect pretty much no one on HN even remembers what the web looked like pre-AdBlock, but it hasn't actually killed web advertising.
  - Retric 17y ago
    I don't use AdBlock. I use a popup blocker, but I think if I am looking at a website I should at least give them the basic revenue of viewing the advertizing. Sometimes I even click on one if I am feeling generous to the content holder. It's much the same with authors, when buying a book I like to click the link Amazon.com from their website because it maximizes their revenue. PS: The problem with the newspaper model is it provides so little value. In the old days they survived on advertizing but there are far more locations for advertizing now, so the pay is far lower. Take the Haiti incident, there was a 7.0 earthquake which killed or injured a lot of people and destroyed most of their infrastructure. All the important information in an SMS post and everything after that point is just entertainment.
    - flatline 17y ago
      The problem with many ads is that they are designed to take attention away from the rest of the site. As a result, you get flashing, jiggling, talking ads that make many sites nearly unusable. Sure, you could avoid going to those sites, or you could just use adblock...
    - w00pla 17y ago
      > I don't use AdBlock. I use a popup blocker, but I think if I am looking at a website I should at least give them the basic revenue of viewing the advertizing. I block gifs and Flash. It is moronic to have text on screen and then have something that is moving in the corner of your eye. You simply can't read it (and if you can, it is not enjoyable).
    - almost 17y ago
      I pretty much agree with you on AdBlock. Except at the moment there are those really horrible teeth whitening ads. I just can't take constantly being shown images of close up yellowing teeth.
- ErrantX 17y ago
  hence it being a soft paywall - considering the savvy work arounds is a non-issue because such people are unlikely to convert anyway if stopped.
- albertsun 17y ago
  It'd be so easy to write an extension or plug-in that just adds a referrer to every request to nytimes.com
patrickgzill 17y ago
My reaction/question is, "what about the NYT's cost structure has been radically changed from what it was 5 years ago"? Think about it, you have successful sites run with minimal overhead, such as 3-5 writers and 1 marketing/business/admin guy to handle the stuff the writers don't know how to do. Compare that to what NYT does.
- samdk 17y ago
  It's not so much that their cost structure has changed--it's that their revenue streams have dried up. Fewer people are reading physical papers, and web ad revenue has been on the decline for the past couple of years. You can't compare the New York Times to a website run by a couple of people. Most small news sites get their content from other small news sites or from larger organizations that do a lot of the actual reporting (like the New York Times).
njharman 17y ago
After all the bitching about how Google (and other aggregaters) are stealing their content they erect a paywall for everybody but search and referral links. Disingenuous much?
tomjen2 17y ago
>10 or 25 cents via your Amazon account; Based on that, if you read 6 articles, you would be better of buying the damn paper - in print. That is the problem, they think that what they want to sell is valuable, but it isn't.
parka 17y ago
There are so many internet business models to explore. Why is it that newspapers are only focusing on the subscription based model?

13 points by unignorant 17y ago

So... they're trusting information provided by the user's browser (referral links, cookies, javascript... whatever) to determine whether or not the article should be displayed to the user.... This makes me want to pat the NYT on the head and tell them how adorable they are. The fact that they're 1+ years away from implementing this may indicate that they have some knowledge about how technologically stupid this idea is, but are hoping that investors don't figure that out.

kgrin 17y ago
On the other hand, I'm not sure how much they care if they don't get to monetize the audience of people technical enough to forge a referrer (or even use an extension that does it for you). I suspect pretty much no one on HN even remembers what the web looked like pre-AdBlock, but it hasn't actually killed web advertising.
- Retric 17y ago
  I don't use AdBlock. I use a popup blocker, but I think if I am looking at a website I should at least give them the basic revenue of viewing the advertizing. Sometimes I even click on one if I am feeling generous to the content holder. It's much the same with authors, when buying a book I like to click the link Amazon.com from their website because it maximizes their revenue. PS: The problem with the newspaper model is it provides so little value. In the old days they survived on advertizing but there are far more locations for advertizing now, so the pay is far lower. Take the Haiti incident, there was a 7.0 earthquake which killed or injured a lot of people and destroyed most of their infrastructure. All the important information in an SMS post and everything after that point is just entertainment.
  - flatline 17y ago
    The problem with many ads is that they are designed to take attention away from the rest of the site. As a result, you get flashing, jiggling, talking ads that make many sites nearly unusable. Sure, you could avoid going to those sites, or you could just use adblock...
  - w00pla 17y ago
    > I don't use AdBlock. I use a popup blocker, but I think if I am looking at a website I should at least give them the basic revenue of viewing the advertizing. I block gifs and Flash. It is moronic to have text on screen and then have something that is moving in the corner of your eye. You simply can't read it (and if you can, it is not enjoyable).
  - almost 17y ago
    I pretty much agree with you on AdBlock. Except at the moment there are those really horrible teeth whitening ads. I just can't take constantly being shown images of close up yellowing teeth.
ErrantX 17y ago
hence it being a soft paywall - considering the savvy work arounds is a non-issue because such people are unlikely to convert anyway if stopped.
albertsun 17y ago
It'd be so easy to write an extension or plug-in that just adds a referrer to every request to nytimes.com

patrickgzill 17y ago

My reaction/question is, "what about the NYT's cost structure has been radically changed from what it was 5 years ago"? Think about it, you have successful sites run with minimal overhead, such as 3-5 writers and 1 marketing/business/admin guy to handle the stuff the writers don't know how to do. Compare that to what NYT does.

samdk 17y ago
It's not so much that their cost structure has changed--it's that their revenue streams have dried up. Fewer people are reading physical papers, and web ad revenue has been on the decline for the past couple of years. You can't compare the New York Times to a website run by a couple of people. Most small news sites get their content from other small news sites or from larger organizations that do a lot of the actual reporting (like the New York Times).

njharman 17y ago

After all the bitching about how Google (and other aggregaters) are stealing their content they erect a paywall for everybody but search and referral links. Disingenuous much?

tomjen2 17y ago

>10 or 25 cents via your Amazon account; Based on that, if you read 6 articles, you would be better of buying the damn paper - in print. That is the problem, they think that what they want to sell is valuable, but it isn't.

parka 17y ago

There are so many internet business models to explore. Why is it that newspapers are only focusing on the subscription based model?