Would you pay to receive your online news?
That’s the question that will finally be answered in the coming months now that the paywall experiment has begun. The idea has been floating around for a long time and after thousands of blog posts on the subject and comments from some of the leading journalists and publications in the country, News Corp International has gone behind a paywall. Users are now required to register for the The Times newspaper site in preparation for the oncoming paid content service.
The times will be charging £1 for 24 hours of access on the fly, and £2 a week for a ‘subscription’ to the online service. The first 30 days will cost £1 and users will gain access to both The Times and Sunday Times as well as mobile access to the site. Users trying to access the content without paying will be greeted with a pop-up asking if they want to take a virtual tour of the sites content and register with the site.
So what has happened so far? You’ve guessed it – the online readership of the site has dropped to an all-time low. The Times market share that was previously reaching highs of around 5% is now struggling to reach a share of 2%, with the latest figures floating around 1.8%. The site has also had a lower viewing time from visitors, down to three minutes from five.
The visitors of the times have been moving towards other newspaper websites outside of the paywall instead. Some, such as the Guardian, created special ‘welcome’ articles introducing the new readers to the site.
The real test is yet to come, of course. Can The Times afford to run with such low viewing figures, even with a paywall subscription? Considering the absolutely amazing wealth of content from quality providers available for nothing on the internet, it seems very unlikely that many people will choose to start digging in their wallets. £2 a week might not be a huge figure, but when it’s competing with free even a price as low as that could have real problems.
Unless the entire industry jumps behind a paywall at once, the majority of readerss are always going to flock to the cheapest source of quality news. Of course, this doesn’t mean The Times paywall will fail to make any money, but it’s unlikely to appeal to many net users who have spent the last 20 years expecting web content without a price.
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Even if The Times is able to level out at some steady number of paid subscribers, it will face a situation where it’s readership is significantly lower than that of other competitors.
Think about the journalists here. Will they be happy for all the research, hard work and writing to be shown to a small or limited audience with The Times? Or would they prefer instead to write for The Guardian, The Independent or any other UK or other newspaper where their work can be accessed and read by potentially billions of people.
Ultimately, journalists are independent business people themselves who want to increase their profile and awareness.
This is already happening – the popular Baby Barista blog has already jumped ship from The Times to The Guardian – http://www.guardian.co.uk/law/baby-barista-blog/2010/jul/02/babybarista-guardian-paywalls
Thus, I believe even if the Times covers costs to keep the subscription going they will see a steady loss of journalists to other media which will undermine their product even further.
paul gray(Quote) (Reply)
I read the times for several hours per day for 3 years.
Ever since the paywall went up I now go to the telegraph, BBC or sky.
Liam(Quote) (Reply)
Who loves The Times enough to pay for the entire newspaper online? The same people who buy the printed newspaper, I think. But readers of the printed version are unlikely to also buy it online, so online-only readership should drop to zero.
I’m a huge fan of The Times and miss it dearly, but not enough to pay GBP100 for my regular browse. I’d subscribe to a pay-10p-per-article model, or an annual subscription of maybe GBP30 per year, but no more. Free news really isn’t all that bad.
Besides, I’m wary of Mr Murdoch and his Fox/Sky propaganda machines. Paywalling The Times is a great way to kick a dirty habit. Thanks, Rupert!
Ozwald Copperpot(Quote) (Reply)