It's a win, but the Salt Lake City Tribune is mostly Utah news. Who doesn't have a paywall now? Fox News. This is a problem.
The Guardian
Making the news available at no cost is a victory
41–50 of 141 posts
Re: Making the news available at no cost is a victory
#42The "Free News" model is certainly something I've struggled to solve. How exactly can you provide impartial, objective reporting when you cant afford the salaries? If the people arent interested in paying... what else can you do?
It’s unfortunate we haven’t solved the micro-payment problem. Crypto was an obvious solution but anything would require a hefty network effect. But imagine like a starbucks card or whatever you have your micropayment card, and it auto reloads when it hits zero with 20 bucks or whatever. When you visit the times, a modal pops up, “This article costs $0.02. Read it? y/n or $1 for a day pass”. Sure pirates will get arou…
An approach that might work is low cost yearly subscriptions. So $6 a year instead of per month. Cost to the consumer becomes $0.50 a month for services that scale well (like news), but avoids the service fee and money laundering problems of micropayments.
Re: Making the news available at no cost is a victory
#43The "Free News" model is certainly something I've struggled to solve. How exactly can you provide impartial, objective reporting when you cant afford the salaries? If the people arent interested in paying... what else can you do?
There's an even more fundamental problem: even if you can pay the salaries, how do you ensure that your organization remains aligned with the original goal? How do you prevent it from being subtly influenced by the confluence of interests it will be exposed to by virtue of wielding influence? How do you defend against less than subtle interests? Note that charging for the news does not defend you against this.
Many people think you should avoid having bias. That may be the correct thing in some circumstances, but I think it's better to intentionally have bias, to make that bias explicit, and then to intentionally work within the framework provided by that bias. It should be open, public, and visible.
This allows for full transparency with the audience, increasing trust, while also giving a public "anchor" to guage your work against.
Many organizations do just this. Outside of news it's often just called "culture" or "branding," but it's more important, IMO, to be explicit, public, and clear about this in a news setting, and very much can serve as away to defend against outside influence.
Re: Making the news available at no cost is a victory
#44The "Free News" model is certainly something I've struggled to solve. How exactly can you provide impartial, objective reporting when you cant afford the salaries? If the people arent interested in paying... what else can you do?
It’s unfortunate we haven’t solved the micro-payment problem. Crypto was an obvious solution but anything would require a hefty network effect. But imagine like a starbucks card or whatever you have your micropayment card, and it auto reloads when it hits zero with 20 bucks or whatever. When you visit the times, a modal pops up, “This article costs $0.02. Read it? y/n or $1 for a day pass”. Sure pirates will get arou…
There is no micro-payment problem from the perspective of the vast majority of publishers. They simply don't want it. End of story.
Re: Making the news available at no cost is a victory
#45Earlier quoted context omitted.
There's an even more fundamental problem: even if you can pay the salaries, how do you ensure that your organization remains aligned with the original goal? How do you prevent it from being subtly influenced by the confluence of interests it will be exposed to by virtue of wielding influence? How do you defend against less than subtle interests? Note that charging for the news does not defend you against this.
I think it'd be a good start to have stories selected and reviewed by a diverse team of editors and fact checkers to make sure that the reporting is factual and that it isn't presented from a limited and biased perspective. You'd also have to be willing/able to burn bridges and risk losing advertisers, donors, viewers/readers, and supporters by reporting on things that offend those same people. That alone would be a…
> You'd also have to be willing/able to burn bridges and risk losing advertisers, donors, viewers/readers, and supporters by reporting on things that offend those same people
That's the structural problem in a nutshell right there. If you're principled enough to do that, then you're at a disadvantage compared to others who are willing to play the access journalism game and the like. You can try to make it up by using your transparency and high standards to attract readers, but in the marketplace that strategy loses.
We've seen this play out. Respected news orgs stand on principle, take a hit but manage to get by on a perception of integrity. Eventually leadership shifts to gradually be more and more business-focused, justifying every step as good for readers and investors, speaking first about the delicate balance between integrity and reach and sustainability. Eventually these words become platitudes as more power shifts to those more interested in profit and power games than in anything the institution was founded on. Every step and every change along the way seems reasonable enough, prudent, even.
That's the trap you need to defend against. I don't know how you do that as a business, though. Setting yourself up as a nonprofit might help stave it off, but even that doesn't seem foolproof.
Re: Making the news available at no cost is a victory
#46The "Free News" model is certainly something I've struggled to solve. How exactly can you provide impartial, objective reporting when you cant afford the salaries? If the people arent interested in paying... what else can you do?
There's an obvious answer: a good public news service.
I know, I know, that one is problematic too. Some countries have pulled it off relatively successfully, but it's never perfect.
The thing is, this is exactly what the government is for: services that individuals don't want to pay for, but are important to have as a society.
This is possible if there's a real division of powers in the government. Yes, that sounds increasingly unlikely now, but it's no fantasy, it has been achieved in many different places and moments in history, to a reasonable degree.
I mean, there's a reason why journalism is called "the fourth estate", maybe it should literally be the fourth independent government branch alongside the executive, legislative and judicial. We are in the "information age" after all. Or at least a relatively independent and technocratic government agency with decent funding.
And don't tell me that "we have it but nobody watches it", then it's just not properly funded or supported. The BBC is extremely competitive alongside commercial news media, both in the UK and internationally. Many countries have similarly strong public media even if it is not internationally as well known, because of the language barrier.
Re: Making the news available at no cost is a victory
#47Earlier quoted context omitted.
If people don’t want to pay, then they don’t actually value the news. I pay for publications that I trust and want to continue reading. The key is finding a niche where the news organization can produce quality reporting that people actually value. “Free News” is just another ad business.
Do you think that the desire to pay for a thing is the only indicator of whether that thing is valued? If not, what do you mean by "[people] don't actually value the news"?
It's a great indicator.
Re: Making the news available at no cost is a victory
#48The "Free News" model is certainly something I've struggled to solve. How exactly can you provide impartial, objective reporting when you cant afford the salaries? If the people arent interested in paying... what else can you do?
I don't think the following is a great idea for many reasons, but it's an idea that has been on my mind for a while and I'd like to share it to hear some thoughts:
Germany has (used to have? I don't follow this closely) the "church tax": citizens are obligated to pay the tax no matter how much faith they have, but are free to channel it to a denomination/organization they believe in.
Maybe a liberal, democratic state could successfully build something similar for news organizations: all citizens have to pay a "journalism tax", which they then channel to a subscription for a vehicle they trust.
Yes, a million ways this can be abused, the government may censor opposition, etc. I know, I said the idea wasn't great. But worth pondering. Also, this is based on a very stylized understanding of how said German tax works (I'm not German and never looked at it that deeply)
btw I understand this is the opposite of "free", but more about journalism financing in general.
Re: Making the news available at no cost is a victory
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
There's an even more fundamental problem: even if you can pay the salaries, how do you ensure that your organization remains aligned with the original goal? How do you prevent it from being subtly influenced by the confluence of interests it will be exposed to by virtue of wielding influence? How do you defend against less than subtle interests? Note that charging for the news does not defend you against this.
Many people think you should avoid having bias. That may be the correct thing in some circumstances, but I think it's better to intentionally have bias, to make that bias explicit, and then to intentionally work within the framework provided by that bias. It should be open, public, and visible. This allows for full transparency with the audience, increasing trust, while also giving a public "anchor" to guage your wor…
On the other hand, some claim that biased news sources can be misleading.
Re: Making the news available at no cost is a victory
#50My first job after college was working at the local newspaper right as subscription numbers crested and declined. It's one of my favorite sets of folks I've worked with and one of my favorite jobs I've had.
The editorial section was distinct from the advertising section with the latter selling against subscription numbers and not meaningfully influencing the former.
It got acquired and the staff got caught significantly as physical and digital subscriptions declined. I don't know what the solution is but I know competition for attention and ad dollars didn't help. Our information environment is worse for the decline of local journalism too.
CalMatters is a nonprofit and provides quality coverage. Perhaps that's a viable model at the state level. https://calmatters.org/about/funding/