Starting 2011, the New York Times will charge readers full access to its website. Acknowledged as the United States’ most popular newspaper site, the national daily once again mounts what majority in the business sees as unpopular.
The third-largest newspaper in the U.S, next only to the Wall Street Journal and USA Today, the New York Times circulation is 995,000 on weekdays and 1.4m on Sundays. In addition to its 16 bureaus in New York, and 11 offices in the country, the daily also has 26 offices around the world.
Not spared by the recent global recession, the New York Times, lost $70 million in the middle of 2009. In the same year, 5% pay cuts were imposed on its reporters, laying-off 100 workers. It was inevitable the major daily would have to seek other forms of revenue.
By 2011, the major daily intends to introduce a meter system requiring readers to pay upon exceeding a set number of online articles per month. The 159-year old daily is the biggest publisher todate to impose such sanctions. In 1996, it failed at its first attempt to charge for website access.
Publishers, however, face a chicken-and-egg situation. Charging for website access predicts less users and less traffic, resulting in less eyeballs for online advertising. A drop in website advertising logically follows.
With the established notion that online users will not pay for news, the New York Times publisher, Arthur Sulzberger was quoted by The Guardian saying, “This is a bet, to a certain degree, in where we think the web is going." Of the controversial decision, his own paper reported Sulzberger stating, "We can’t get this halfway right or three-quarters of the way right. We have to get this really, really right."
According to a BBC report, the United Kingdom’s Financial Times earlier introduced a similar online payment model for website access. In the same report, media mogul Rupert Murdoch and his News Corporation is next in line to start charging for access to its online newspapers.
In August 2009, the Newspaper Association of American requested proposals from technology companies for paid content solutions. Internet giant Google responded with a system of micropayments to launch in 2010. The system may hold some hope for newspapers for new ways to charge users for their content.
“While we believe that advertising will likely remain the main source of revenue for most news content, a paid model can serve as an important source of additional revenue. In addition, a successful paid content model can enhance advertising opportunities, rather than replace them,” reported in a New York Times article in September 2009.
