JSOnline is becoming a paid site (update, reply #73: so is Madison dot com)

[RockCoCougars]

This is a poor business model for the newspapers period. I will fully admit that I'm cheap, but since the Journal went to charging, I visit it much less. I will do the same with the Madison paper (though you can still read the articles without registering if you are willing to scroll around the box. I understand that circulation is way down, and especially classified advertising, but they are going to lose traffic on these sites big time by charging.

[NeedMoreFans]

I don't understand charging people who subscribe to the print edition. That should be a perk. Their justification is there is a lot of content that is online but not in the printed editions. Also, they are being very vague about what content will remain free and what counts towards your 20 views. The editors in the comments say that if you van get the info elsewhere, it is free.

[patrickgpe]

i know for jsonline if you get your paper delivered you get free access to the online material

[WV Brew]

Racine Journal Times has also gone pay per view. I wonder if they will get a dozen subscribers?

[patrickgpe]

the industry is in real trouble. the problem is that most people if they had their choice would rather read the morning paper on their smartphone or computer. by making it a pay site, you will definitely lose viewers which means less advertising money. its hard to convince people to pay for something that has been using it for free for so many years. also in todays time, there are tons of places to get the same info that are still free.

[jerichoholicninja]

I just read an interesting article about the decline of newspapers the other day.

 

The author was stating that their decline is not because of technology or less interest in reading but because newspapers have decided to deal with declining revenue not by making their product better but worse. Instead of adding content to the paper to increase interest they've chosen to cut staff and local coverage and content to save money and in it's place put advertising or nothing.

[patrickgpe]

that is the problem, if jsonline offered content different than what was available on the blogs, more would pay for it. for example even though the journal sentinel employs a full time baseball beatwriter, the content on this site, deciples of uecker, and brewcrew ball are all similar and free.

 

the advantage is its all in one place. onmilwaukee.com does do great entertainment / dining content, wispolitics is great for politics etc....but you actually have to visit all of those sites to get the info.

[RockCoCougars]

Personally, I think that the MJS is a pretty good paper with a good website. The problem for me is paying for something that I've gotten for free since 1995 (I believe). Newspapers these days are pretty much caught between a rock and a hard place. Circulation has to be way down as the population gets more connected (frankly the only newspaper subscribers that I know are either older or businesses), I'd bet that ad revenue is way down as well. Frankly, in my opinion, these days the main purpose of newspapers should be to cover local news and sports. By the time they hit the press, most of the world/national news is well, old news. The world has changed and these stories are readily available in a million other sources. All that said, is there really enough local news to fill a daily newspaper? Probably not. In the end, the only way that they will survive is to find a way to boost website advertising revenue. To me, charging for access to the website is going to kill traffic and hinder that possibility.

[hawing]

I don't understand charging people who subscribe to the print edition. That should be a perk. Their justification is there is a lot of content that is online but not in the printed editions. Also, they are being very vague about what content will remain free and what counts towards your 20 views. The editors in the comments say that if you van get the info elsewhere, it is free.

Sorry in advance; a hawing rant is probably forthcoming.

I have been following the madison-dot-com policy changes of the last two weeks with moderate interest. Once JSonline began charging for content, I figured it was but a matter of time before they followed suit. But I much prefer the approach taken by the JS: they announced their intentions a couple of weeks in advance and were up front about saying they would charge, how much, and what the subscription options were.

 

In contrast, madison dot com:

- Implemented its "registration required" policy with zero notice. The explanatory story was posted to their website at 12:15 AM the day the change took effect.

- Said nothing about $ in the initial "registration required" story.

- Didn't disclose the subscription costs, or that a paid subscription would be necessary, until at least a day after registered users began to see the "five free premium views left" screen. Then they made that explanatory story (and a related FAQ story) "premium content," so if you'd already unknowingly looked at too much local content, you can't even read the explanation or FAQ.

 

I'm not saying they should give it away. It wasn't "free news" when it was only in print - I get that. But their approach was unnecessarily abrupt and frankly seems sneaky. I see no customer-focused value to doing it that way. Had they announced that "in two weeks we're going to change access and here's how," I'd be more likely to feel like participating.

 

Charging print subscribers for online content (even if it's less, and even if it's just $1.95/month) is also mind-boggling to me. The State Journal's remaining print subscriber base - it's dropped in the last year-plus - is likely hanging on to the print edition because they're into reading news in print, and they are probably not the audience to try to woo with "online extras" like being able to post your own hateful anonymous comments or whatever. (Using my mother as an example, she's decently Internet-savvy for her pre-baby boomer age group - but she's deaf and will get nothing out of madison dot com video content unless they start to caption it.)

 

I realize this was inevitable, but Capital Newspapers took a customer-unfriendly route to get there, which is disappointing but unfortunately not surprising to me. Lee Enterprises, their corporate parent, is the suck in my mind.

[fondybrewfan]

The Fond du Lac Reporter is now also going to a PPV site. This from a paper that basically reprints stories from other papers with no meaningful stories of there own other than prep sports. Yeah I am sure people will be lining up to pay for a newspaper that is already worthless

[hawing]

I think we can expect these changes in access from all area Gannett and Lee newspapers. The Lee Enterprises newspapers in Wisconsin:

Baraboo News Republic

Beaver Dam Daily Citizen

Chippewa Herald (Chippewa Falls)

La Crosse Tribune

Wisconsin State Journal / Capital Times

Portage Daily Register

Racine Journal Times

Vernon Broadcaster (Viroqua)

Westby Times

 

The daily Gannett papers in Wisconsin:

Appleton Post-Crescent

Fond du Lac Reporter

Green Bay Gazette

Manitowoc Herald Times Reporter

Marshfield News-Herald

Oshkosh Northwestern

Sheboygan Press

Stevens Point Journal

Wausau Daily Herald

Wisconsin Rapids Daily Tribune

 

The issue (pun unintended) of newspaper access arose recently at my library, which for decades has microfilmed or bought commercially produced microfilm of Wisconsin newspapers for long-term access. A few years ago, my library stopped buying film for most Wisconsin papers, instead purchasing the digital files for each newspaper that belongs to the Wisconsin Newspaper Association. Most of these files are visible to Wisocnsinites through Badgerlink (http://www.badgerlink.net - you need to either be in a Wisconsin library or enter data from a Wisconsin library card for access).

 

This was OK until Gannett decided it didn't want to participate in Badgerlink, so at present the Badgerlink interface has no access to the Gannett papers listed above, and our microfilm records generally end in 2005 or soon after.

 

We are all in the midst of a sea change for access to local information. It will be harder for future researchers to gain access to local news - not because of technology, but because of information owners/producers limiting access.

[davego]

Most of these rags should pay us to bother with their "content."

[berniebrewer4life]

Most of these rags should pay us to bother with their "content."

 

This. I have no problem paying for solid journalism(i'd pay for the NYT in a second, and might start to), but i refuse to pay for dreck just because they are the closest paper to my house. When i can get news from all over the world within seconds, there is just no reason to settle for bad.

[trwi7]

Why pay for it? Just delete your cookies and you can get the content for free.