The Verge raises a partial paywall: ‘It’s a tragedy that garbage is free and news is behind paywalls’ | Semafor

Comments

• adam_y@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  If it is behind a paywall, it isnt news, it is an asset.

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  • sunbeam60@lemmy.one ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    So physical newspapers aren’t news?

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    • nyan@lemmy.cafe ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      “Can I have that once you’re finished with it?” Physical newspapers are subject to being given away by the original purchaser (or getting picked up from cafe tables or pulled from trashcans—people used to leave the damned things lying around everywhere), if you can’t afford to pay for them. It’s a bit more difficult to do that with digital content.

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    • Passerby6497@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      News papers are a physical item, not bits hidden behind a boolean set to true. Plus, I can go read a newspaper at the store if I want to.

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• narc0tic_bird@lemm.ee ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  I’m not sure how sustainable this model is. Especially when a reader browses via a link aggregator and therefore reads news articles on many different websites. I doubt most people want/can afford a subscription on dozens of different news outlets, as that’ll quickly add up to a triple-digit monthly bill.

  Something like Flattr, but maybe non-optional, would be better. Pay a fixed monthly fee and split the payment between all sites you read articles on (maybe based on how many, or reading time or whatever).

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  • fluxion@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    $1-$2 month maybe: they want $7 which is close enough to a Hulu/Netflix subscription fee that you immediately realize it’s not tenable to subscribe to all the major news sites you read, so then you start needing to build a “top 5” in your head because that’s all you can reasonably budget and that’s either too much of a PITA for whatever article you’re trying to read or you realize Verge isn’t in that top 5 and move on

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    • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Even $1 is probably too much. I read articles from dozens of different sources and managing that would royally suck. Got a new credit card? Have a fun next hour of your life logging in everywhere…

      No, just give me an add-on so I can pay to bypass a paywall. I don’t want an account everywhere, I just want to read your article, and I’m willing to pay a few cents to do so (way more than they’d get with ads).

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    • M600@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      That price is way too much. My wife and I use Netflix for hours each day on average. I get significantly more use out of netflix. There is no way I’m paying a website like the verge $7/month when I can get the same new for free from some YouTuber.

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  • MagicShel@lemmy.zip ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    I would do this with one caveat: sometimes people link really garbage articles. There was one here yesterday written so poorly I feel less informed for having read it. I would like the option to take my money back for reading such a bad article.

    I do want to pay for news, but I can’t subscribe to everyone, or even just “the good ones”, because I do use aggregator sites.

    I also wonder if that would lead to a model of paying every website for content because if Reddit is good enough to train AI on and good enough that many people include it in their Google searches, who is to say the comments aren’t “articles”?

    or reading time or whatever

    Could result in badly written, overly long articles and poor UI to force people to take longer. I know you’re just spitballing, but thought I’d point out how easy it is to induce unintended consequences.

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    • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Exactly. Give me an add-on to pay to bypass paywalls for a few cents and they’ll get my money. I’m not making an account or paying a subscription, but I’m happy to leave some change in the donation box.

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    • AusatKeyboardPremi@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      There was one here yesterday written so poorly I feel less informed for having read it. I would like the option to take my money back for reading such a bad article.

      That’s hilarious.

      Do you mind sharing the post?

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  • Rogue@feddit.uk ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Flattr was such a good concept, it’s so disappointing it never caught on

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  • MurrayL@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Pretty sure that’s the model Apple News+ uses, but the price has always seemed pretty steep to me compared to other subscription services.

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  • IsThisAnAI@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    God forbid we read a few sources and avoid clicking on 60 links for the same story.

    Sounds like a Reddit/Twitter/Lemmy addiction more than anything.

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• ryper@lemmy.ca ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  The official announcement says they did because people have been asking for a way to support the site, but it’s not at all clear those people had a paywall in mind. Ars Technica has had subscriptions for years, and they paywall extra site functionality like topic filtering and a full-text RSS feed, not content.

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  • BearOfaTime@lemm.ee ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    This is the way.

    Same with mobile apps. And give me a way to support a dev without using Google Play (I realize iOS is more problematic).

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• dinckelman@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  Ironically, it’s news that’s free, and garbage is behind the paywall

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  • iamericandre@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    The verge I remember from a few years ago tried to make a video on how to build a pc and look how that turned out

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    • dinckelman@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      That’s current Verge for you. It only got worse since then

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• bitwolf@sh.itjust.works ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  A paywalled article about a news site adding a paywall…

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• BearOfaTime@lemm.ee ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  Well vox is garbage anyway, so no loss.

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