4 ms·

It's a symptom of the fact that people on the whole do not want to pay for news. It's a failure of capitalism that the positive externalities of local news are

It's a symptom of the fact that people on the whole do not want to pay for news. It's a failure of capitalism that the positive externalities of local news are not captured by the people who generate it (just like a failure of capitalism that the negative externalities of so many things aren't borne by those that generate it)

njharman 8y ago
What we get in USA is not news though. Esp on TV. It is weather, sports, gossip, fluff pieces, war/disaster/crime (typically non-local), political sound bites. With 1/3 to 50% ads depending on medium. All those news types have better and or free sources. With more depth and detail. Problem with tradituinal news orgs are that they attempt to serve everybody so is generic, shallow. And thus very low value. Very low.
- CM30 8y ago
  Yeah, this pretty much sums up another media dilemma nowadays. The internet has made jack of all trades services obsolete, and so people don't need to rely on a single source for all that stuff any more. So the everyday newspaper or TV news network that tries to cover everything simply can't compete with a legion of experts covering their own specialities.
  - isostatic 8y ago
    In the past news organisations used to pay for those people to find out what's happening in Ruralton, TN, and let the people know. People now aren't willing to pay for those experts, so the only ones that cover the news are those with other agenda
st26 8y ago
Personally I feel like I would happily pay small amounts for news, but nobody has figured out how to frictionlessly pay $0.00004 to read a news article I'm interested in. We're stuck right now with only two models, $15-30/mo subscriptions subsidizing hordes of non-payers, or ads.
- isostatic 8y ago
  Agate (http://agate.one http://agate.one) seems a reasonable way, but unless it builds a following I don't see it lasting.

njharman 8y ago

What we get in USA is not news though. Esp on TV. It is weather, sports, gossip, fluff pieces, war/disaster/crime (typically non-local), political sound bites. With 1/3 to 50% ads depending on medium. All those news types have better and or free sources. With more depth and detail. Problem with tradituinal news orgs are that they attempt to serve everybody so is generic, shallow. And thus very low value. Very low.

CM30 8y ago
Yeah, this pretty much sums up another media dilemma nowadays. The internet has made jack of all trades services obsolete, and so people don't need to rely on a single source for all that stuff any more. So the everyday newspaper or TV news network that tries to cover everything simply can't compete with a legion of experts covering their own specialities.
- isostatic 8y ago
  In the past news organisations used to pay for those people to find out what's happening in Ruralton, TN, and let the people know. People now aren't willing to pay for those experts, so the only ones that cover the news are those with other agenda

st26 8y ago

Personally I feel like I would happily pay small amounts for news, but nobody has figured out how to frictionlessly pay $0.00004 to read a news article I'm interested in. We're stuck right now with only two models, $15-30/mo subscriptions subsidizing hordes of non-payers, or ads.

isostatic 8y ago
Agate (http://agate.one http://agate.one) seems a reasonable way, but unless it builds a following I don't see it lasting.