Even if it’s crappy content from the New York Times:
The New York Times will stop charging for access to parts of its Web site, effective at midnight tonight.
The move comes two years to the day after The Times began the subscription program, TimesSelect, which has charged $49.95 a year, or $7.95 a month, for online access to the work of its columnists and to the newspaper’s archives. TimesSelect has been free to print subscribers to The Times and to some students and educators.
Wow, now I can read Maureen Dowd for free. That, and about $ 20.00 a day might actually make it worth reading what she writes.
More interesting, though, is that the Times is also opening up access to a large part of it’s historical archives:
In addition to opening the entire site to all readers, The Times will also make available its archives from 1987 to the present without charge, as well as those from 1851 to 1922, which are in the public domain. There will be charges for some material from the period 1923 to 1986, and some will be free.
In typical NY Times fashion, though, they tried to make the TimesSelect fiasco seem like a good idea:
The Times said the project had met expectations, drawing 227,000 paying subscribers — out of 787,000 over all — and generating about $10 million a year in revenue.
In other words, only 28% of the people who registered with the Times website subscribed to TimesSelect.
And they call that a success.
No wonder nobody at the New York Times understands economics.
September 18th, 2007 at 12:06 am
Links and Minifeatures 07 30 Sunday…
UN rights body orders US to shut “secret” jails. No word on well-known gulags worldwide. Or several dozen entire countries that imprison their entire population. ********** Mexican Man who lied to get Border Patrol job sentenced I ran a whole……