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Asking members to support journalism, The Guardian raises more revenue than ads

niemanlab.org

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Re: Asking members to support journalism, The Guardian raises more revenue than ads

#311
post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really like the wikipedia model, but I know it wouldnt work for every outlet. I’ve contributed more to public radio and wikipedia than any other news service subscription. Ideally, nytimes/wapo/economist would be completely open, and one would be able to ‘donate’ with a single press of the apple pay button. I prefer that over yet another username password combo + subscription + app echo system I need to maintain. O…

The big worry is that this doesn't work for local news at all. The nitty gritty details of governance happen at the local level - municipal and state/provincial legislatures. Journalism on that stuff doesn't scale.

Arguably it works better. Minnesota Public Radio has 127,000 members [wikipedia], which is a bit over 2% of the population of MN. They do a far better job covering stuff like city politics than any other news organization in town.

The Guardian has 300,000 members [this article], which is 0.4% of the population of the UK. (And arguably, the better denominator would be the entire anglophone world.)

Re: Asking members to support journalism, The Guardian raises more revenue than ads

#312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't subscribe to an objective morality. There are things that I value and attempt to maximize, but I don't feel the need to compel all sentients in the universe to adopt my position. I'm willing to "live and let live," with the understanding that conflict will still happen sometimes and that's okay.

The language is tricky in this area; I'll try to be clear. There seems some confusion in your concepts; at least I'm confused about them. I don't claim to have this stuff all worked out; sorry if it's not helpful. It sounds like, for you, 'subscribing to an objective morality' would involve feeling the need to make everyone 'adopt your position' - share your beliefs? do as you do? I don't think there are actually man…

You talk about something being: 'wrong, full stop'

How can you tell if this full stop "wrongness" is occurring?

Any answer you give is going to be an explanation of how the full stop "wrong" thing violates some set of principles or reduces something you value. Not all people will agree on which principles or values to privilege as the arbiters of right and wrong.

The whole thing will become a game of definitions.

To your last point: No. My way of looking at things is not "better" in any cosmic sense. My question would be:

"Better at what?"

I value what I value. You value what you value. There's a whole planet of people with their values. Many will align, many will conflict. This is normal.

I don't believe those with values different from mine are "wrong, full stop" or "evil, full stop."

Re: Asking members to support journalism, The Guardian raises more revenue than ads

#313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Guardian on "Correct the record": https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Awww.theguardian.com+%... https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/oct/13/wikile... https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/sep/15/bernie-sande... https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/may/17/when-is-a-ca...

> "Correct the Record, that is solely focused on defending her record." > “Correct the Record”, a rapid rebuttal unit Portraying them as some sort of superhero warriors/defenders is precisely what OP was talking about.

I don't think we read the same links. "defending" and "rebuttal" are in none of the links I gave.

Re: Asking members to support journalism, The Guardian raises more revenue than ads

#314
post #35

I think that most media outlets make a wrong assumption about online content. They think that everybody wants content that's free above all else, so they swamp their content with ads. But I think it's more that people want diversity. I'll happily support news outlets financially, but at $300/yr for Globe&Mail and $260/yr for NYTimes, etc, the cost is just ridiculous. I WANT to support good journalism, but I want to p…

> The salable entity in the internet era shouldn't be a subscription to a newspaper, it should be an article. I think this is spot-on. My guess is that a browser based micropayment solution/ecosystem will emerge (a la Brave and its Basic Attention Token).

Take a look at Blendle. It does exactly this - pay-per-article - and aggregates quite a few popular publications already.

Re: Asking members to support journalism, The Guardian raises more revenue than ads

#315
I’m one of these new subscribers (from Viet Nam) that this campaign appeals to. The offer was too good to ignore ($1 for first 6 weeks, $4 each week after for the Guardian Weekly). There’s a bit of adjustment from my side because stories and writings in the print edition are different from my usually top-HN, popular-Twitter articles, but I’ve grown to it. Local expats in my place have no idea of this free int’l delivery, so for a long time they have been paying local importers/newstands a heft ton of money for these papers.

Re: Asking members to support journalism, The Guardian raises more revenue than ads

#316

I would be happy to support The Guardian etc. But this persona does not have credit/debit cards. So I have no way to pay them. I do support GnuPG and Riseup, however, because they accept Bitcoin.

I think that asking paywalled sites to support Bitcoin is a good way to stop them from posting provocative articles and could calm down the crazy speculative market.

I'd like Bitcoin to find its niche in payments for intellectual property.

Re: Asking members to support journalism, The Guardian raises more revenue than ads

#317
post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess it's Alan Rusbridger employing his wife and daughter: http://www.anorak.co.uk/393065/reviews/nepotism-watch-the-gu...

OT: Are you the same gadders who used to hang out on the Popbitch board?

Yes, but I left that life behind. You had the same username there?

Re: Asking members to support journalism, The Guardian raises more revenue than ads

#318
post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They also make use of offshore tax structures to minimise their taxes, such as the £302m profit from selling Auto Trader magazine. https://blogs.spectator.co.uk/2016/04/will-the-guardian-now-...

How would offshore tax structures help them, considering they're making losses at the moment?

It was the profit from the sale of Auto Trader magazine.

Re: Asking members to support journalism, The Guardian raises more revenue than ads

#319

A quick review of UK print media 1) The Times - Rupert Murdoch mouthpiece. Employs MP Michael Gove for £100k a year after he was sacked for being a backstabber. 2) The Mail - "The EU and immigrants want to kill your children and sleep with your sister and may even affect your house price". Billionaire owner too. 3) The Telegraph - "The Torygraph" former paper of the ruling classes, now mouth piece of two weird billio…

>So if you didn't want Brexit, think immigration is helping demographics, think Princess Di should be laid to rest now and don't think the world is full of benefit scroungers, there is only the Guardian left.

So, we should only read newspapers that agree with our world view?

Re: Asking members to support journalism, The Guardian raises more revenue than ads

#320

Can't be happier with this! Proof that people are willing to pay for quality. In The Netherlands we just got news that public service television etc sees an unexpected drop of income through ads (they're 60 mln euros short on budget in 2019). The quality of the online public news service is declining (clickbait titles for instance). Hopefully The Guardian sets an example!

Quality? If the Guardian is considered quality journalism, the others are probably not worth the paper they are not printed on.

Most links to the guardian I see are opinion pieces clearly made with a certain audience in mind. It is an echo chamber: people pay to read what they want to read.

Does quality journalism exist at all? The only exception seems to be technical subjects, like science and engineering. And that's because there is a huge amount of effort being made to avoid bias at every level. And even that tends to be thrown out of the window as soon as it hits a popular journal.

Where are the journals where fact are analyzed from several point of views. Take net neutrality for instance, where are the articles that really talks about the pros and cons? My opinion is that net neutrality is a good thing, I don't need a paper telling me what I am already convinced of. No, I want a paper to first explain me what net neutrality really is, and what are the drawbacks and how it compares to the positive aspects. It may not change my mind but at least I will be more informed.

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