Baltimore Sun to start paywall Oct. 10

Pay walls are a must-do. But if you subscribe to the print product, you should be given online access as part of that package IMO

 

So to save newspapers, it's rate should be "suggested"? If only the NY Times has as many fans as Radiohead. Too bad it costs more to put out a daily edition of the paper than it is to make produce an album.

 

Bingo. Once you finish an album, you're basically just trying to make money to recoup costs (and make a tidy profit, of course). Other than promotion, there's not a lot more you have to sink into the cost. If it takes you six months or a year to make that sum you're doing pretty well. The product also has a shelf life of ... eternity.
Newspapers are a perishable item. Most of their content "spoils" within a day or two. Yet the cost of producing a large newspaper is probably the same or more than what it takes to produce and promote an album. You cannot recoup that cost through a donation model, on a daily basis, before the information spoils.

Plus, didn't the Miami Herald already try this? And wasn't it an abject failure?

 

But it worked for Radiohead. It HAS to work for everything.

 

As an Orioles fan, the Baltimore Sun will get me reading MASN and Orioles.com a lot more starting Oct. 10.

I understand why newspapers are doing this online (hey, the NY Times did so can we!), but it seems like a typical lemming maneuver with no long-term foresight. The youth needs to be captured and this is not the way (nor the platform) to do it. Just my 2 cents, feel free to rail on me.

 

This theory is why I only listen to bands trying to recreate OK Computer.

 

This is why the paywall is only part of the (potential) solution. The Sun has to offer something readers can't get at those other places. Maybe the increase in paywalls will also lead to newspaper companies renewing their investment in enterprise. I'm probably being too optimistic.

 

I wish someone would create a pay site that gave me access to all kinds of newspapers.

I'm willing to pay, but I'm not going to pay for more than one or two.

If someone would bundle them, then you could split the revenue based on page views.

Plus, then you could put up a real paywall instead of allowing 15 or 20 "free" views.

 

There was a company which tried to do this - and I am blanking on the name (Journalism Now?) but recall it was run by a guy who maybe you didn't want to run a company.

Anyway, a lot of papers signed up and went through research and were supposed to launch this thing ... last year. Appears they've all given up on that and now are on their own.

 

I think metro dailies have lost the dedicated sports reader anyway.

I can think of two Ravens writers I read regularly online. Neither one of them works at The Baltimore Sun now.

 

Newspapers let the horse out of the bar far too long ago. Now it's tough getting it back in. Plus, the Tribune newspapers don't have that much to offer much anymore.