Globe and Mail to start charging users for content

[Moonbox]

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/globe-to-charge-readers-for-online-content/article2429120/

Pretty self explanatory. I remember they used to charge people to access a lot of their articles online, but they stopped doing it probably 5 years ago. This has been my newspaper of choice for some time now, but I have to admit, I'm cheap enough to start reading elsewhere if this costs more than a few bucks a month. I don't buy newspapers themselves because I don't get $1 worth of interesting reading out of one of them, so I wonder what the cost model will be for the Globe moving forward...

[Boges]

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/globe-to-charge-readers-for-online-content/article2429120/

Pretty self explanatory. I remember they used to charge people to access a lot of their articles online, but they stopped doing it probably 5 years ago. This has been my newspaper of choice for some time now, but I have to admit, I'm cheap enough to start reading elsewhere if this costs more than a few bucks a month. I don't buy newspapers themselves because I don't get $1 worth of interesting reading out of one of them, so I wonder what the cost model will be for the Globe moving forward...

Even though content on the net is where many people choose to get their national news now, internet advertising still doesn't come close covering the costs yet. Print advertising still makes up a good chunk of the revenue.

It's a tough choice to make but I guess the Globe considers it's readership high-end enough that they would pay for the content even if it's on the web.

[Moonlight Graham]

There's other free stuff online out there, in hordes. The Globe & Mail doesn't provide me with enough original content at high enough quality (hello, corporate news media) to make me even think of considering paying for their articles.

[Topaz]

They aren't the only ones, and I'm sure they all will but it may fail if no one decides to read the paper online. http://ca.news.yahoo.com/blogs/dailybrew/canada-major-newspapers-set-introduce-line-paywalls-231613026.html

[Moonlight Graham]

They aren't the only ones, and I'm sure they all will but it may fail if no one decides to read the paper online. http://ca.news.yahoo.com/blogs/dailybrew/canada-major-newspapers-set-introduce-line-paywalls-231613026.html

Interesting.

If most of the big chains start charging in full, it would be a great disservice to the ability of Canadians to stay informed. The internet brought the ability to have easy access to a huge variety of sources instead of just relying on the daily paper on your front step & some TV clips. People are again only going to pay for one newspaper source if any, not several.

I'd be interested to know exactly how much these newspapers make/lose.

[Bonam]

There will always be free alternatives. If a newspaper wants to charge for content, it better have enough unique and high quality content to be worth the price. Otherwise their readership will decline substantially. The G&M doesn't strike me as the kind of source that can't easily be replaced by free alternatives.

[Argus]

I read the Globe every day, mostly for the business news. I agree with some of the comments made on their story which deride them for comparing themselves to the New York Times. The Globe just isn't that good, or that original, and there isn't a lot of content which can't be easily found on other Canadian news sites. Aside from their business news and a few local Toronto stories I don't care about most of their news is straight from the wire services anyway.

[August1991]

From OP:

The number of free articles per month hasn’t yet been announced, nor has pricing.

“We have chosen to go for the big move rather than do it a step at a time,” Mr. Crawley said. “Based on what we see going on in the advertising market, we’ve decided to go for it now. We had already made the decision, it was a case of how quickly we would do it.”

These guys are clueless. Edited May 19, 2012 by August1991