A quick and overdue post on the very sad news that The Observer may be put to bed by Guardian Media after 218 years of existence.
The debate over how available online news should be and how much, if anything, should be charged for accessing content on the web has been in full flow for a while now.
Despite all the arguments one way and the other, it is clear that being charged for news is the future, the very near future if Rupert Murdoch's plans to charge for Times content come to fruition soon. My personal vision is that of a pay-as-you-go approach and a monthly fee to read an unlimited number of articles, similar to that of mobile phones.
It is surely unsustainable that news junkies such as myself can log on and browse pretty much every leading mainstream media's valuable news free of charge. I read the Sunday Herald and the Scotland on Sunday on my phone on the M6 this morning, totally free of charge. Our newspapers' most valuable asset is out there for all to see and they are receiving a paltry adverting income in exchange.
Successful businesses understand what value their assets possess and maximise the income accordingly. Of course this can result in companies like Ryanair charing to use the bathroom but fair play to them, they have a business model that is working.
Newspapers clearly don't.
But we should move forward with peril because we need quality newspapers as much as they need us. Much like politicians, we may decry their value on a day-to-day business but they are a fundamental part of a process that works and should remain as it is.
Thankfully MPs can't be priced out of the business. Many of us grudginly tramp out to our local polling station every four years to return the least worst option on the ballot list, realising there is a duty to take part even if many of us really would rather not.
I think it's the same sense of duty that is required for newspapers and that's the reason I have a neatly folded Sunday Herald and a Scotland on Sunday sitting on the table that may or may not get read over the remainder of this evening. My £1.50 is a donation on behalf of the online content that I read some 7 hours ago. However, most readers of the online content are not so charitable.
So I would urge people to decide which is their least worst option not just on their ballot lists but also on the newsagents' shelves, to hand over a bit of hard hearned cash every now and again to lend support to a struggling industry that is too important to fall.
£1 a day is a price worth paying to keep our media alive. The alternative, a Government not being adequately scrutinised by professional journalists, is a cost that doesn't bear thinking about.
Bring on the charges for online news. It's the future and I for one am buying.
Salmond vs Trump
11 minutes ago
10 comments:
The Independent is now supplying a widget for iPhones in order for the paper to be read off line.
As for your comment about £1 a day to read a few online newspaper Jeff, I couldn't afford that so I wouldn't be able to access them.
Then again, many European countries provide much more insight into UK politics than UK based papers and they're not talking about this profit making scheme.
How many political bloggers contribute to the Scotsman or the FT? I should think the FT has far more of course.
This is all part of the process to dumb down information but the web won't permit it.
Oh the Independent iPhone widget is free I believe.
Problem is politics. I have all the papers - well the readable ones ( ie not the record/sun/daily crap) - bookmarked. But I don't read that much. A glance across the headlines, the odd columnist I like. Most of the content doesn't interest me, and worse raises my hackles politically. I stopped bothering with the Herald and the Scotsman after the elections to Holyrood last time out. They are propaganda for Zanu. I refuse to be told how to think.
So I'd prefer a modest few pence an article charge, if charge they must. So I can deny the bastards income when they print some spin doctored crap that favours the old regime.
And the BBC should be the same model. I don't like paying a hefty tax to be told how to think there either. I'll just buy QT, HIGNFY, and Top Gear ( sometimes, but he is funny) , and they can keep Kirsty's opinions to themselves.
Oh you pesky youth, again with the controversy.
Charging for news, that's free elsewhere is not a good idea. Unless your take on the news is compellingly thought provoking and entertaining, Joe Browser will simply move on to a free site which allows its journalists an opinion.
Murdoch has shown himself to be completely out of touch with this.
The only way to successfully create a pay as you read service is to completely kill off the dead tree press, aka no alternative but to subscribe.
Then again you'll never kindle a fire or do a crossword on an I-phone...
I can see the logic of your argument Jeff, but I think what you have to bear in mind is that it is going to decimate the blogosphere. Paying for articles also means that you get tagged, which is going to be a problem for those who blog anonymously. I can't help feeling that the real motive here is to control the flow of information and the sixth column that is the blogosphere. In medi-politics the government has been really censorious; the march of 10 000 junior doctors on Parliament had a D notice slapped on it. This is normally reserved for matters of military security. The result was that the march barely got reported, despite the Queens' surgeons being part of it. I've got a bad feeling about it.
Can I recommend Witchdoctor's take on this; she has done 12 posts on it. They're short and to the point. Here's the most recent;
http://witchdoctor.wordpress.com/2009/08/09/wd-apology-12-the-future/
First up, i think 'the blogosphere' is taking itself far too seriously if parts of it think this is all a ruse to kill it off. Like most things in life, this is simply about cold hard cash and a way to forge a new business plan from the dying embers of the old one. As for affordability. Subrosa, I can certainly sympathise that £1 is pricey for some but nike trainers and Iphones for that matter are expensive but we don't see them getting handed out for free. Why? Because nike and apple would go bust is why, as Times and Guardian and Scotsman will if they continue on this path. We'll always have free online news with the BBC, note also that the tv license is paid by those who have tvs so we're not currently paying for BBC News. That of course is a risk, why would people pay for Times and Scotsman when we have free BBC? For me, the papers have more depth, a wider range of stories and more intelligent commentary and consequently deserves our support.
Monty, I don't see why a business model of printed news the good old-fashioned way sitting alongside online news for a charge wouldn't work. I am assuming that all newspapers would follow suit otherwise I agree that Murdoch would be too far out on a limb. Also, the standard of news coverage and journalism will only improve if it sits in a competitive market and the correct value is placed upon it. Journo's are getting sloppy as they can post any old drivel up online with tighter and tighter deadlines facing them. It's all free anyway so who cares about quality, hey! No they need to sell their stock in the marketplace like most other businesses.
I don’t buy any of them any more, and very rarely read the free online content. Mostly because it’s largely not worth reading. That does not mean that I am unable to keep up with what is most interesting and current. A large reading list on the blogosphere is all that is required. Let those who are interested and can afford it pay for the stories they want and then disseminate them via the web to the rest of us. Is that not what by and large happens at the moment?
The televised BBC (Scottish) news is almost always garbage so much so that I have now taken to watching STV at least their local content however light weight makes some attempt to be local by having separate bulletins for Dundee and Aberdeen which the BBC never do unless someone is murdered in Dundee or Aberdeen while at the same time no one is murdered in Glasgow or Edinburgh. As for serious news on the BBC I often find the radio is better for that UK wide, and you don’t need a TV licence to listen to the radio.
Speaking as an ex-Scotland on Sunday journalist your £1.50 will be much appreciated at Johnston Press but it is sadly too late. The merger of staff between SoS and the Scotsman went ahead a couple of months ago, effectively creating a seven-day Scotsman and meaning an end to the stand alone Sunday title.
From a crew of 50 or so only three or four journalists remain dedicated to SoS (two subs, one reporter and possibly a deputy editor) with what remains of the staff also working on the daily (including the newish editor). The same has happened at the Sunday Herald and (i think) the Sunday Mail, meaning Scotland has three fewer separate titles than before. Some may rejoice, but I think this is sad for the Scottish media industry, democracy and Scotland as a whole.
But anyway, about Murdoch's plans... a wiser man than me named Malcolm Coles (http://www.malcolmcoles.co.uk/blog/) wrote this http://tinyurl.com/nmkj72 for Econsultancy.
And very interesting it is too.
Post a Comment