In The Blogs

Paying for the NYTimes.com

| Thu Jul. 9, 2009 2:24 PM PDT

— Tim Bower

The New York Times is surveying print subscribers (hey, why not me?) to see if they would consider paying an additional $2.50 per month to get the NYT.com content that is currently free. Non print subscribers, the survey explains, would have to pay $5.

This is silly. To be clear, I believe the NYT has every right to charge online readers, if they think that'll work. Journalism takes money. Journalism is essential for a healthy democracy. Journalists work hard and deserve to be paid adequately for the work that they do. Yes, yes, I know all about Judy Miller, and some journalists are in it for their own fame. But many got in, and stay in, for the public good. And most toil away with no fame and an unclear future on the horizon.

How bad is it? The Times is the country's best paper, and likely to be the last one standing. Yet management there recently sent out a memo telling staffers to cut out texting, calling 411, and making international calls on staff cell phones and Blackberries. (God forbid we talk to someone in Iraq.) The Bloomberg story which broke the $5 paywall story notes that not only has print advertising all but vanished but online ad sales at the NYT and its sister papers are way down too, falling "8 percent and 3.5 percent in the first quarter and fourth quarter of 2008 respectively. They gained 6.5 percent last year." So much for the theory that online ads will (eventually) save us all.

So yes, charge online. And charge me for my crack-er-mobile access. I'll totally pay. But man alive, are you really saying that if I keep paying for the print edition—which I'm only doing to do my part to keep you afloat, which costs me @ $1,300 a year, which comes at great green guilt despite SF's recycling program—you'll only discount me a small latte's worth of the price you charge everybody else?

According to the Bloomberg piece there are only 647,695 weekday home subscribers. That's a scary low number; MoJo has a little more than a third as many print subscribers. Until the Times, or somebody, anybody, figures out a revenue model to ensure reporting's survival, I'll pony up and pay the $1,300 and the damn $2.50 (x12=$30). But I wouldn't count on most home subscribers to follow suit.

But perhaps the Times scheme will help do the messaging that journalists have been for too long too reticent to do. That we are what stands between you and governmental and corporate corruption. That following decades of deregulation, our watchdog powers are more in need than ever. That sustained beat reporting can't be done by people in their spare time. That lovely features and beautiful photo essays and book and movie reviews and all the rest great journalistic institutions offer is what makes for a great Sunday morning and a bareable subway ride. And that the Daily Show or NPR or CNN or Rachel Maddow can't do their job unless scores of other reporters do theirs. And that reporting takes money, dammit!

How can you support the reporting that Mother Jones does? You can subscribe, a bargin at a mere $15. Don't like dead trees? Take heart in the fact that our paper is 90% recycled or get the digital edition. You can also help us by signing up to our newsletters. There's a tipjar at the end of every story and blog post. You can give to our investigative fund, or our intern program in which we train the next generation of investigative journalists. Learn more here.

Clara Jeffery is Co-editor of Mother Jones. Read more of her stories here. And follow her on Twitter here.

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Comments

Well actually the Wall

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu Jul. 9, 2009 4:48 PM PDT.

Well actually the Wall Street Journal is the best newspaper in America and with its firewall between the news and editorial staffs, the most balanced. So no, the Times isn't going to be the last newspaper standing, actually I hope they are one of the first ones in the water. In a country with 300 million people, to say that they have under 700,000 subscribers is to say that their business has virtually dried up.

As far as I'm concerned the Times has the sin of omission down to a science. That is the essence of their bias. They conveniently omit the stuff that doesn't fit their ideology-like sleazy Democrats- but report every piece of dirt they can on Republicans. And they practice it without shame.

I'll read an occasional Times piece as long it is linked to something for free. I stopped reading it when they charged on-line for it. The Times has become as corrupt as the people in government they supposedly cover, its time to shutter the paper.

The WSJ is a good paper

Submitted by Clara Jeffery on Thu Jul. 9, 2009 6:34 PM PDT.

But, though Murdoch has plans to broaden its NYC arts and cultural coverage, is still a paper of a much narrower appeal. It primarily sticks to doing one thing—covering all things business related—very well, if, nearly uniformly, from a pro-corporate perspective.

But we're a 'pro-business'

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri Jul. 10, 2009 3:50 AM PDT.

But we're a 'pro-business' country, that's how we can afford to have a 3 trillion+ federal budget and do all the things that government does. It behooves everyone to read and learn about business. I think that is something that get lost in the fog of politics.

Behooves indeed

Submitted by Clara Jeffery on Fri Jul. 10, 2009 12:39 PM PDT.

"It behooves everyone to read and learn about business." No argument here.

That piece of shit costs $3.50 an issue?

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu Jul. 9, 2009 5:28 PM PDT.

Or are they printing more than one a day so that there's enough room for Kristol's ego?

Kristol's been gone for a few months now...

Submitted by Clara Jeffery on Thu Jul. 9, 2009 6:24 PM PDT.

Ross Douhat, formerly of the Atlantic, has taken that op-ed spot http://blogs.usatoday.com/onpolitics/2009/03/conserative-ros.html

Putting it bluntly, there is

Submitted by Grant (not verified) on Thu Jul. 9, 2009 5:48 PM PDT.

Putting it bluntly, there is no easy answer. The quickest and most efficient way might be to charge visitors for viewing the paper, but that would probably make readers unhappy and opens up the problem of safe bank transactions online. I would rather pay for the print version but that opens up the problem of trees and the fact that I am an unemployed college student. I hate to say it but newspapers might eventually disappear in their entirety unless humans themselves change first.

An unemployed college

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri Jul. 10, 2009 3:52 AM PDT.

An unemployed college student? Perhaps you should have been reading the Wall Street Journal instead of the Times.

Journalists deserve to paid

Submitted by Anthony (not verified) on Fri Jul. 10, 2009 5:56 AM PDT.

Journalists deserve to paid fairly. I too am an unemployed college student (majoring in Journalism and hoping to work for a publication or program like MoJo or Democracy Now!) and I think everyone should be able to access non-corporate reporting and information affordably, if not for free.

The non-profit model (i.e. those doing all the work getting paid fairly; no CEOs; and certainly no one profiting in excess) is one to consider, in my opinion.

Neither the NYTimes nor WSJournal are great in reporting (and the latter is quite disturbing in editorials). I agree that the NYTimes sins frequently, perhaps systematically, in omission-- but often with more important things than political scandals.

Indeed we are a "pro-business" country. But many of us are more concerned about people and the environment, not maximizing profits and getting off on the free market-- sorry, Free Market (religious tolerance and respect is also important).

I understand what you are

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri Jul. 10, 2009 10:55 AM PDT.

I understand what you are saying and probably agree with most of it but if you really care about people you have to care about maximizing profits (within the context of fairness of course, we're not talking about the greedy whores who rape the system). Our system is based on maximizing profits. Its what every business owner- large and small- does. That's what supports the entire system and how we grown- and our citizens increased their standard of living- from the poor country we were into the worlds richest with the highest standard of living. We didn't just tax our way to a 3 trillion federal budget.

We seem to be on this anti-business, anti-wealth kick. It's dangerous. Even more so as the economy falters and unemployment rises.

maximizing profits is destructive

Submitted by MHG (not verified) on Fri Jul. 10, 2009 12:17 PM PDT.

The idea that profits in all businesses should be maximized, rather than held to some reasonable level has not been good for the country, and it has in fact been destructive for many of the businesses who adopted it as a model or had it forced on them by outside, short-sighted investors. It has helped lead to huge and growing inequality, the inability of average workers to live on their incomes, and other problems. Further, maximizing profits today inevitably has meant not looking very far into the future, failing to treat workers with the respect they deserve for hard work over the years, environmental problems and many other difficulties.

Why do you assume maximizing

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri Jul. 10, 2009 2:41 PM PDT.

Why do you assume maximizing profits precludes long term investment in plant and equipment, Research and Development, healthcare benefits and fair and equitable salaries for employees? Oh that's right this post was originally about the New York Times and you're a subscriber aren't you?

Case made.

Times sub cost

Submitted by MHG (not verified) on Fri Jul. 10, 2009 12:06 PM PDT.

Clara,
Why do you pay $1300 a year for the Times?
I just checked my current quarterly bill. It's $211 and change, or about $846 a year for seven-day home delivery. That's still an awful lot, but not nearly your number. (I live just across the Bay from you, in Oakland.)

Times sub cost

Submitted by Clara Jeffery on Fri Jul. 10, 2009 12:37 PM PDT.

Perhaps I remembered the cost wrong. I'll check my statements tonight and report back. However subscription costs do vary depending on how long you've subscribed and what kind of deal you bought into at the time. And they just raised them. Still, If I erred I apologize. By the way, something that never goes mentioned in the story of lost journalism jobs is how many people who physically make and deliver the paper are losing theirs too. I also keep subscribing b/c the guy/gal who nails the landing for us every morning—thereby deterring the Mission hipsters from stealing it, which used to happen 1 in 2 mornings—is a genius.