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New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers

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Re: New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers

#61

Post by jagger27 »

ehsankia wrote: post #44
TheAceOfHearts wrote: post #9

It's surprising to see how small they are. Only 3.8 million subscribers, and you have to imagine that some percentage of that barely reads their content. I wonder if there's public numbers estimating how many people in total read the New York Times, and how it compares to emerging forms of media and entertainment like YouTube. One criticism of New York Times that I've read online is that they won't allow you to cance…

I canceled mine last week exactly because of those dark patterns. They also show ads even if you have a subscription, which sounds very backward to me. I'd love to support them, but those practices don't belong in 2018. EDIT: Oh, looks like the cancellation didn't go through and they charged me for one more month, sweet. I might just go to my bank and tell them to block the source. Or even better, I may have found a…

The PayPal trick worked for me.

Re: New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers

#62

Post by alpb »

spondyl wrote: post #57

As much as I like the NYT, as mentioned below, their unsubscribe functionality sucks. I sent them an email last December requesting to unsubscribe. I didn't follow up on it and eventually forgot about it. Eventually, they email me around May to apologise that my email was "delayed" due to a technical glitch they had just discovered. Great but I still never got an actual unsubscription processed. A few months later, a…

Their mobile app is worse: Any article shows 7 instances of the same ad in a rather short article. So any article is basically 70% ads. This is even when you have a paid subscription. Even the NYT lost the high ground on the ad-free reading game.

Re: New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers

#63

Post by _carl_jung »

gandutraveler wrote: post #54

I love their 'The Daily' podcast. They pick one topic everyday and dive deep over 30 mins. Overall a happy NYT subscribed for last 6 months. I paid 110$ for 1 year membership and got a free Google home device. Great deal!

This smells a little shilly. Glad for you if not though.

Re: New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers

#64

Post by manigandham »

comex wrote: post #14
TheAceOfHearts wrote: post #9

It's surprising to see how small they are. Only 3.8 million subscribers, and you have to imagine that some percentage of that barely reads their content. I wonder if there's public numbers estimating how many people in total read the New York Times, and how it compares to emerging forms of media and entertainment like YouTube. One criticism of New York Times that I've read online is that they won't allow you to cance…

They apparently have no fewer than 130 million monthly readers, though, according to a press release from last year: https://www.nytco.com/year-of-audience/ I̶ ̶g̶u̶e̶s̶s̶ ̶a̶ ̶l̶o̶t̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶p̶e̶o̶p̶l̶e̶ ̶b̶u̶y̶ ̶n̶e̶w̶s̶p̶a̶p̶e̶r̶s̶ ̶i̶n̶d̶i̶v̶i̶d̶u̶a̶l̶l̶y̶.̶ [edit: that number isn't for physical newspapers, see replies]

These numbers are usually completely off. There is no standard basis or reliable determination for them, and it's in every publishers interests to quote as high as they can get away with.

Buying traffic from cheap ads can easily get you millions of "readers" who just hit the page from various IPs and leave some cookies around.

Re: New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers

#66

Post by Niten »

undreren wrote: post #19
TheAceOfHearts wrote: post #9

It's surprising to see how small they are. Only 3.8 million subscribers, and you have to imagine that some percentage of that barely reads their content. I wonder if there's public numbers estimating how many people in total read the New York Times, and how it compares to emerging forms of media and entertainment like YouTube. One criticism of New York Times that I've read online is that they won't allow you to cance…

> One criticism of New York Times that I've read online is that they won't allow you to cancel your digital subscription through their website. They force you to call them. I'm not sure if that has changed recently, but that's a pretty questionable dark pattern. This is illegal in Europe. By law, it has to be at least as easy to cancel subscriptions, as it is to buy them. I love Europe. :)

It's also illegal in California, too, so I expect NYTimes will ultimately have to change their behavior: http://www.niemanlab.org/2018/07/thanks-to-california-a-news...

Re: New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers

#67

Post by wyattpeak »

manigandham wrote: post #64
comex wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They apparently have no fewer than 130 million monthly readers, though, according to a press release from last year: https://www.nytco.com/year-of-audience/ I̶ ̶g̶u̶e̶s̶s̶ ̶a̶ ̶l̶o̶t̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶p̶e̶o̶p̶l̶e̶ ̶b̶u̶y̶ ̶n̶e̶w̶s̶p̶a̶p̶e̶r̶s̶ ̶i̶n̶d̶i̶v̶i̶d̶u̶a̶l̶l̶y̶.̶ [edit: that number isn't for physical newspapers, see replies]

These numbers are usually completely off. There is no standard basis or reliable determination for them, and it's in every publishers interests to quote as high as they can get away with. Buying traffic from cheap ads can easily get you millions of "readers" who just hit the page from various IPs and leave some cookies around.

That's not true. Basically all periodicals' circulation numbers are independently audited, because nobody will buy ads from them without an audited figure. Only the very smallest fly-by-night publications self-audit.

Re: New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers

#69

Post by thirdsun »

TheAceOfHearts wrote: post #9

It's surprising to see how small they are. Only 3.8 million subscribers, and you have to imagine that some percentage of that barely reads their content. I wonder if there's public numbers estimating how many people in total read the New York Times, and how it compares to emerging forms of media and entertainment like YouTube. One criticism of New York Times that I've read online is that they won't allow you to cance…

> One criticism of New York Times that I've read online is that they won't allow you to cancel your digital subscription through their website. They force you to call them. I'm not sure if that has changed recently, but that's a pretty questionable dark pattern.

They let me cancel via chat a few months ago. Obviously I'd have prefered the press of a button to cancel, but even via chat it was a quick and painless affair.

Re: New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers

#70

Post by matt4077 »

TheAceOfHearts wrote: post #9

It's surprising to see how small they are. Only 3.8 million subscribers, and you have to imagine that some percentage of that barely reads their content. I wonder if there's public numbers estimating how many people in total read the New York Times, and how it compares to emerging forms of media and entertainment like YouTube. One criticism of New York Times that I've read online is that they won't allow you to cance…

Far more than 3.8 people actually read the NYT. First, because it is often handed around in families/at work, or left in a subway for the next passenger to read.

And everyone else gets to read or hear about the Time's work the next day, when every other news outlet copies their work.

Nobody appreciates the value of journalism, because we feel inundated in it. But it's only copying and distribution that are free. When you try following everything back to its original source, it's a surprisingly small number of publications doing most of the work.

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