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> Paywalls offend me. The Internet exists to share knowledge with everyone across the world. You shouldn’t need a subscription, all you should need is an intern

> Paywalls offend me. The Internet exists to share knowledge with everyone across the world. You shouldn’t need a subscription, all you should need is an internet connection to access the world’s knowledge. That is some Grade-A willful ignorance. Professional writers who perform their due diligence get paid. Professional photographers who travel and document important causes get paid. Editors who ensure accuracy and good writing get paid. Good, shareable knowledge costs money to produce and you're supposed to pay for it.

teeray 4y ago
Piracy is a usability problem. People want to read one article, not subscribe for a year. This is just like pirating one song instead of buying the album.
- towaway15463 4y ago
  Banks need to get their shit together and allow micro transactions.
- notjustanymike 4y ago
  Piracy is a business problem. They'd happily sell you one article a year if you're willing to pay more to offset the lack of a predictable revenue stream. Feast or famine tends to be a big problem for sustainability though, and it's one reason companies like Adobe moved Photoshop to a subscription model.
  - teeray 4y ago
    Right, the problem is nobody cares about the business at all. They care about the content. The same problem exists for streaming services and cable TV channels before them. People want one or more specific shows, they don’t think Netflix is any better than Hulu, and are happy to cancel and move their streaming dollars from service to service when something else interests them. Subscriptions just subsidize mediocrity.
- melenaboija 4y ago
  And that is why Spotify exists and has been successful. Maybe is worth to try something different than digitalizing paper press and make people pay yearly subscriptions for one publication.
  - teeray 4y ago
    Spotify is an anomaly. We should have a bunch of services with names like Sony+, Universal Now, Warner Music Stream, and Atlantic Listen at this point.
SeanLuke 4y ago
This is all true. Paywalls are a reasonable method to pay content makers and there is nothing wrong with them per se. What I find offensive is paywalls which lower themselves selectively in order to SEO Google and Bing. That is, they're inserting their walled gardens into my searches of the open web in the hopes of manipulating me into subsidizing them. This is simply unethical. Also people posting paywalled articles on HN is very irritating.
bogomipz 4y ago
How about login walls for free content? Most news sites allow for a limited number of free articles a month except that their version of free requires I create an account and log in. So a major news site like the nytimes will always surface to the top of Google search results and if I select their article I am met with: >"Thanks for reading The Times. Create your free account or log in to continue reading." And even should you go through with creating an account and logging in, you are stuck with an ever present creeping footer that advertises a paid subscription as well as advertisements that are inserted between paragraphs of the article.
- notjustanymike 4y ago
  That content isn't "free". It's a sample, given away at cost by the Times, intended to engage you just enough to become a paying customer. Remember that all this stuff costs money to make, so when it's "free" its purpose is still to make money, one way or another. The ad model is becoming unsustainable, people are catching on to the "we sell your personal information" approach, so businesses are now exploring the free + friction model in greater depth. I'm not sure what you expected with the creeping footer. As a free user you don't drive enough revenue for them to sustain their business, so they're forced to introduce friction into the user experience to convert you into a real customer.

teeray 4y ago

Piracy is a usability problem. People want to read one article, not subscribe for a year. This is just like pirating one song instead of buying the album.

towaway15463 4y ago
Banks need to get their shit together and allow micro transactions.
notjustanymike 4y ago
Piracy is a business problem. They'd happily sell you one article a year if you're willing to pay more to offset the lack of a predictable revenue stream. Feast or famine tends to be a big problem for sustainability though, and it's one reason companies like Adobe moved Photoshop to a subscription model.
- teeray 4y ago
  Right, the problem is nobody cares about the business at all. They care about the content. The same problem exists for streaming services and cable TV channels before them. People want one or more specific shows, they don’t think Netflix is any better than Hulu, and are happy to cancel and move their streaming dollars from service to service when something else interests them. Subscriptions just subsidize mediocrity.
melenaboija 4y ago
And that is why Spotify exists and has been successful. Maybe is worth to try something different than digitalizing paper press and make people pay yearly subscriptions for one publication.
- teeray 4y ago
  Spotify is an anomaly. We should have a bunch of services with names like Sony+, Universal Now, Warner Music Stream, and Atlantic Listen at this point.

SeanLuke 4y ago

This is all true. Paywalls are a reasonable method to pay content makers and there is nothing wrong with them per se. What I find offensive is paywalls which lower themselves selectively in order to SEO Google and Bing. That is, they're inserting their walled gardens into my searches of the open web in the hopes of manipulating me into subsidizing them. This is simply unethical. Also people posting paywalled articles on HN is very irritating.

bogomipz 4y ago

How about login walls for free content? Most news sites allow for a limited number of free articles a month except that their version of free requires I create an account and log in. So a major news site like the nytimes will always surface to the top of Google search results and if I select their article I am met with: >"Thanks for reading The Times. Create your free account or log in to continue reading." And even should you go through with creating an account and logging in, you are stuck with an ever present creeping footer that advertises a paid subscription as well as advertisements that are inserted between paragraphs of the article.

notjustanymike 4y ago
That content isn't "free". It's a sample, given away at cost by the Times, intended to engage you just enough to become a paying customer. Remember that all this stuff costs money to make, so when it's "free" its purpose is still to make money, one way or another. The ad model is becoming unsustainable, people are catching on to the "we sell your personal information" approach, so businesses are now exploring the free + friction model in greater depth. I'm not sure what you expected with the creeping footer. As a free user you don't drive enough revenue for them to sustain their business, so they're forced to introduce friction into the user experience to convert you into a real customer.