This bit here resonates with me, though:
We’ve kept the faith with readers despite dreadful economic convulsions. We’ve prudently managed to do more with less, staff streamlined via generous buyout packages, more resources poured into the online version of the paper, reporters multitasking to produce video, blog, tweet, while still filing the regular quota of stories. We’re all, in a way, radio reporters today, banging off copy for the web on quick turnaround deadlines, updating.
That’s the Hamster Wheel playing out in real life. The productivity imperatives imposed by digital logic and media disruption have fallen, more than anywhere, on working newsrooms to a degree that is not fully appreciated, except by, well, the Federal Communications Commission.
A paywall might be a means to slow the wheel a bit, especially if subscription revenue turns out to be more valuable than digital ads and the quality imperative takes hold. As Doctor says, under the paywall/membership system, “content counts more than ever.”
As I say, a paywall is not an end. It’s really a beginning, a chance for a new start. But it’s only a chance. Combativeness toward critics is okay; belligerence is probably not. There’s no template for being great. The Toronto Star will have to find its own way. But it starts with an attitude, and it’s the “We’ve kept the faith with readers” idea that will make the paywall work.
h/t Jay Rosen via Dan Gillmor.
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Starkman, I like your analogy that's starts off with " like a comfy enclosed bunker with heating and ventilation and reserves of water, fuel, and food....," but who is it amongst your readers that is going to recognize the reference to "the Maginot Line." You'll be lucky if any of them below 50 years of age even knows there was a first WW, or what purpose the Maginot Line served. Or didn't serve for that matter, as your analogy suggests.
#1 Posted by Jack, CJR on Wed 7 Nov 2012 at 09:03 PM
Paywalls ignore the consumer pattern of reading 10-20 publications every day. Supporters/promoters of paywalls continually look at the issue from the POV of the publication, not the customer/end reader. We're supposed to fork out subscription $ to these many paywall services, and also incur the benefit of having to endure the same level of ugly display and interruption advertising? How does that improve reader experience, or surface "good" journalism? I would possibly contemplate paying a subscription for one or two quality papers such as the NYT, but multiply that by 10 or 20 paywalls and I'm trashing my bookmarks and relying on aggregators. Or maybe I'll just go for a walk outside instead.
#2 Posted by Chris Dollard, CJR on Sat 10 Nov 2012 at 09:30 AM
Chris Pollard is part of the entitlement generation...here is a bulletin...you don't work for free and journalists should not be expected to do so either. Objective journalism is dying and the lack of revenue to support it is part of the problem. Pay walls are in the consumer's favor. Only through revenue streams will real, objective journalism survive. And only through real, objective journalism will freedom and democracy survive. If journalism is not supported you, Chris, will only be able to read what the propagandists want you to read. When I say propagandists please understand they are left, right, corporate, etc.
#3 Posted by Jack Bick, CJR on Mon 19 Nov 2012 at 01:37 PM