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Blendle ditches pay-per-article service

dutchnews.nl

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Re: Blendle ditches pay-per-article service

#12

Post by tannhaeuser »

I'm curious what exactly didn't work out. Maybe it was just the friction of signing up to read a single article? In that case, maybe what would've helped is sending the article anonymously via MMS and use carrier billing? Like 1990s ring tone downloads, though I'm not sure this model would even work today because Google's Stagefreight bug (or was it on purpose to close another channel not benefitting Google?) made telcos block MMSs. But then again, Blendle switching to a subscription model would indicate otherwise.

Re: Blendle ditches pay-per-article service

#13

Post by microtonal »

3bodyProblem wrote: post #7

I think a 10 euro subscription service is a lazy business model, only one worse is everything based on ad revenue. I loved the fact that you could buy articles instead of getting another subscription. I tried to buy an article last year, I'm not 100% sure why, but I never succeed in reading the article that I wanted to read. I just wanted to pay like 10 euro's until i needed to pay the next 10. But they were already…

I loved the fact that you could buy articles instead of getting another subscription.

I disliked the pay per article model, because it reinforces how expensive news articles actually are in the real world (outside ads-sponsored, click bait articles). I also tried their subscription model, but disliked it even more because you could only read the articles that they (or some ML algorithm) selected. It seems that they now offer unlimited magazine articles (but no newspapers), but magazines do not really interest me.

In the end we decided to take a newspaper subscription again. The price is somewhat steep, but you have unlimited access, and most of the money ends up where it should go.

Re: Blendle ditches pay-per-article service

#16

Post by klez »

CaptainMarvel wrote: post #15

I tried signing up for Blendle, but they rejected my email address for failing validation. I contacted their customer service, but their response was incredibly poor.

Do you mind elaborating on what made it poor? I was waiting for them to open in Italy, so I never had any real chance of interacting with them, so I'm curious about what the experience would have been like.

Re: Blendle ditches pay-per-article service

#18

Post by Freak_NL »

tannhaeuser wrote: post #12

I'm curious what exactly didn't work out. Maybe it was just the friction of signing up to read a single article? In that case, maybe what would've helped is sending the article anonymously via MMS and use carrier billing? Like 1990s ring tone downloads, though I'm not sure this model would even work today because Google's Stagefreight bug (or was it on purpose to close another channel not benefitting Google?) made te…

How would MMS help unless you read Blendle on a smartphone? Hardly anybody uses MMS in the Netherlands in any case (Blendle is Dutch).

Re: Blendle ditches pay-per-article service

#20

Post by Freak_NL »

Blendle didn't succeed in getting the major national newspapers on board, because providing access to all content would make them a publisher competing directly with each newspaper's own subscriptions.

If you consider the price of a full subscription to a quality newspaper, you can see why Blendle would be way too cheap to sustain as a publishing partner; especially with a monthly flat fee.

As a reader, I would love to pay what I am paying now for one newspaper to gain access to more newspapers — particularly worldwide (Volkskrant, NRC, German FAZ, some Belgian ones, some American ones, some British (although The Guardian is already accessible — I donate a small sum yearly for their efforts)).

I wouldn't necessarily read more, but a more varied selection of articles. A flat fee is a requirement though.

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