The Media Drop

There’s been a lot of discussion lately about the possibility that online newspapers may begin charging for content in some way, shape, or form on their websites, as the readership begins to shift from “paid” circulation for print editions to an online distribution. This is obviously something that is of concern for a lot of bloggers, as blogging for most is all about links - and if articles are behind paid walls, then most bloggers are going to have trouble getting their readers to follow links - though one would assume that many bloggers might have a subscription or seven to some online pubs, based on price.

There are a lot of factors in play here, the most important of which is the ability for a news organization to fund itself. While advertising online at publications these days may do a great job at bringing in plenty of revenue to cover the costs of staffing a website - technically - and paying bandwidth and development cost, it surely does not cover any and all costs of the manpower gathering the news itself. Conversely, the paid circulation of newspapers is also a small piece of what the monies needed to fund your daily paper on a regular basis - hence advertising, which “picks up the slack,” we might say. All that said, if we were to take Newspaper X today, keep all the newsgathering, writing and editing bodies at desks, plus whatever administration and general costs that went into the business, and kicked the printing presses out to the curb - publishing exclusively online - we’d have a problem, based on today’s advertising rates and volume.

The obvious solution seems to be smack dab in front of us - readership would be much higher for the online site (by design), sans any readers that don’t use computers, but you would raise your CPM (cost per thousand) ad rates for the online presence - justifiably. It’d be shocking, but would probably eventually work out. But that doesn’t mean you could still operate as the same Newspaper X that you were before.

[ed: Note that much of this is theoretical and/or based on conversations with those in the news business]

So today, when I caught this post by Steve Rubel where he points out that “Newspapers who go down this arrogant path may not be able to return to prominence online ever again,” I couldn’t help but think, “Oh really?”

So, content providers who are currently charging for content to those who purchase print editions are arrogant if they decide they need / want to charge for the news and information that they have done so with for….ever, more or less? That’s a big statement to make. I don’t disagree that consumers will hit blogs and other folks “in the know” in order to get secondary relaying of information - but here’s where the quandary comes in. Newspapers and other publications that are charging are going to be much less tolerant of those who are currently going a little bit beyond the fair use way of publishing and information distribution - what do you think is going to happen when “Joe Blog” is reprinting better portions of stories with his own comments, etc., and suddenly becomes a big hit because he happens to be the one guy with a subscription?

Now let’s be clear - I can’t say I’d be super happy if I had to pay for access to many of these publications, but who’s to say that concepts like micropayments won’t become mainstream when something like this would happen? Perhaps the Salon.com model of “day passes” would move into play? But to state that the newspapers who would choose - again, maybe by need - to charge for content are being off-track is just that - off-track. The advertising could not - at least in the short term - make up for the gap lost by advertising sales on the print side. And since advertising rates on the print side are based on the readership levels of a publication, it’s only a matter of time before the shift makes a big dent in some major names.

Blogs are a resource that, at least as of today, are complementary to the publications they link to. The newspapers and magazines are not banking on blogger-linked readership to make or break them - yet. Rubel’s use of MarketingVOX and Adrants as examples of sites that are taking away from mainstream advertising publications are perfectly valid - but neither of those blogs could exist with the same staff levels and skills as what Ad Age or Adweek have today. It’d be tough to argue that those publications are “outdone” by any advertising weblog, no matter how good it is. Heck, blogs use those magazines as sources for their own entries and commentary. And as someone who writes for an advertising blog, AdJab, I will state up front that it’s all about knowing where to look for the information, news releases, and contact persons at agencies or PR firms in order to write about them. This isn’t something that we woke up and realized in the last six months. It’s the way that publications have been started, from the ground up, forever - the distribution channel has changed, and the barriers to entry are now falling down all over the place. But just because we can blog about whatever industry or topic we want doesn’t mean that some sites won’t stink at it or ever gain any respect or readership - perhaps deservedly. Writing off “mainstream” media is all fun and games, but as we’ve learned with moves like the newspaper joint venture purchasing 75% of Topix.net and the presence of digital teams within newspapers becoming more prominent, those outlets aren’t going to be the one losing an eye anytime soon, if they know what’s good for them. Their resources still outbank 99% of any up-and-comer on the ‘net.

Sites will always allow linking. However, sites like Variety.com and others who have abstracts about their articles and where subscriptions are necessary definitely get less link love from blogs because of just that - but those mags haven’t gone out of business (yet?). It might soon be impossible, as a commenter on Rubel’s blog states, to start charging for articles. But there has to be some happy medium that readers and publishers can reach - because once again, TINSTAAFL rules the roost - there’s no such thing as a free lunch. If you want news to read and link to and rant about, expect a “cost” of some sorts to be in the plans. If you don’t, you’re not only devaluing the news that you want to read, but are missing the point - open source doesn’t work for everything. If it did, certain forms of economics and government that will remain nameless would be slightly more popular these days.