I am so sick of clicking on a hometown newspaper and hitting a paywall. At some point

[Maraya1969]

they are all going to paywalled. Do they think everyone is going to pay for their little site, (like every hometown newspaper)? I'd love if someone set up a site that lists all the pay sites and there were some extension that indicated them when you do a search. I don't mind the ads, (well I do but I realize everyone wants to make money) I hate the sites that are filled with them and you spend your time clicking off videos and looking at information that is on so far covered that you can only see 2 inches at a time.

And I realize that DU is a paysite but the times that my payment lapsed I don't remember things popping up all over. I just remember ads around the edges.

It just seems as if everyone is so damn greedy now. And I'm sure a lot of people cannot afford all these pay sites. I've been to charity sites, like charity navigator and they ask for donations and that is fine and I've donated.

Rant over.

[Emile]

1. When we were kids who could ever dream we would

someday have to pay to watch TV.

[no_hypocrisy]

5. Or paying for water?

[Conjuay]

16. Or

Pay to fill your tires

[hlthe2b]

2. It is only going to get worse... Ignoring dying print newspapers for the moment, but news in

general is increasingly eschewed by younger generations-- unless it appears on social media streams. Bye bye, network and cable newscasts; bye bye local news; and the worst, bye bye any source of local reporting except for the gossip-driven "Nextdoor" and similar neighborhood websites/forums.

I would strongly support a model (similar to public radio and public television) where Federal tax $$ could help fund local news across the country--whether it be newspapers & their associated digital sites--or local news on tv/radio. By that I mean supplement-- not totally fund. Then the news groups could get together (yeah, right, but I can dream) to negotiate a fair means to disperse a single subscription rate per household the bulk of which would go to local news, but a percentage dispersed throughout the news organizations, thereby allowing for nationwide access. I'd gladly pay $100 or $200 a year for that, knowing that I'd also be making at least local television news available for all who can't subscribe and for the ability to read news from any locale, news site, or newspaper in the country sans any restrictions.

It won't happen in this political climate, but I don't know how else we are going to save independent (and especially local) news.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

3. Oh, did they deliver a free daily newspaper to your house back in the day?

[Maraya1969]

6. No, but I also don't just use one source for information on the web. I think they pay to

move up in the search engines. If you are looking for a certain item you want to buy from, say Home Depot you have to scroll past a bunch of other pay for sites. I have made the mistake of clicking on the wrong site because it was first on the list., I was trying to change my air ticket. The company I got through to looked like they were American airlines but they were a travel agent and I ended up paying and extra $2,000 to change my ticket one day.

I got my bank to take that off and I found the real American airlines and they charged nothing.

[cyclonefence]

4. I use an adblocker

and when a site asks me to turn it off, I exit.

I am happy to pay for any newspaper site, but it's annoying to have to go through this shit over and over. I wish there were a system whereby you could automatically be charged (Paypal or something) for each visit to any newspaper or magazine site. I do not want a subscription beyond that single use--I subscribe to a newspaper and magazines enough--and I don't want to go through the rigamarole of subscribing (free trial!) and then unsubbing when I've read what I want to.

I have suggested (to scorn from other DUers) that we as individuals each buy a subscription to WaPo and the NYT--maybe ten of us or more--and share a pw, so that those of us who don't like to read a newspaper online aren't saddled with a year's subscription we don't really use. In my case, it truly isn't spending the money; it's wasting the money for a subscription just for myself. And I do want to support print media--my father worked for newspapers all his life.

I don't know what the solution otherwise might be. I do want to follow stories cited in posts here but usually don't if there's a paywall. I wish it were otherwise.

[Maraya1969]

7. That's a good idea. I love it when people post a link as a "gift" I would put some money in

so everyone could access Washington Post and NYT

[brooklynite]

8. Hmmm, paying your reporters and editors is "greedy".....

Care to name a “hometown” newspaper that’s raking in profits?

[Maraya1969]

9. They can do that with ads. I click off my ad blocker for these sites. There are so many

small news sites that it would be rediculous and tactically impossible to pay for all of them.

EDIT - I often donate to sites. But them taking money every single month and me having to remember all of them is a hard "no"

[former9thward]

24. Ad revenue is directly dependent on the number of subscriptions.

No advertiser is going to advertise in a local media if there are no subscriptions. So they can't fund themselves off ad revenue alone.

[Maraya1969]

25. Google analytics will tell you how many people came into your site. They don't have to pay

I learned about this when I sold on Etsy

[former9thward]

30. Advertisers don't care about how many clicks were on a site.

They want to see commitment. That way they know their ads are being seen. You are telling the ocean tides they do not need to come in.

[John Shaft]

36. Clicks are literally how digital advertising is measured, simply speaking

There are other issues that come into play, though.

[Midwestern Democrat]

53. Online ad rates are FAR less than what newspapers and magazines could rake in back in the day and why wouldn't they be?

Glossy full page cigarette ad in "Newsweek" in 1984 vs some online popup ad in Slate in 2023 - there's not a question which ad was more eye catching and effective (and thus much more expensive).

[RainWalker]

10. Just use archive

Use [link:https://archive.ph/|]

[Maraya1969]

12. Yea, I should always just use it. Thanks

[RainWalker]

14. You're quite welcome

Hope you have a wonderful day 🙂

[dwayneb]

41. Won't let me get past the captcha

Even when successfully completing it several times, just circles back.

[RainWalker]

45. That sounds like a firewall block

[Hope22]

11. Check with the library.

Ours has free online access to many newspapers and publications.

[DBoon]

33. Yes, support your local library.

Get a library card and see what they have online.

[dwayneb]

43. Good point I always forget this

Just makes sure you wash your hands afterwards and don't touch your face.

[Hope22]

52. I think you will get access over the internet!

Yea, no touching😁💗!

[Basic LA]

13. Just picked my LA Times off the driveway.

Been doing that for 50 years and never expected it to be free. I even tip the delivery guy every Christmas. Seems normal to pay for an actual paper, but online feels kind of virtual, so I understand what you mean.

[dwayneb]

44. Local metro paper here is pretty useless

My elderly MIL loves to read it, but delivery is sporadic at best. If you complain you get get a $.25 discount for each one they miss lol.

[Voltaire2]

15. Your problem will resolve itself.

Local newspapers are mostly going out of business.

[usonian]

17. Contributing to the digital divide.

When all verifiable information is paywalled, only lies will be free.

[Maraya1969]

40. Oh that's right! I'm going to renew my NYT subscription. Thanks for that meme

[BannonsLiver]

18. Righteous rant

Now, back to reality. How do you expect the people that put the news together, attend the city council meetings and write about them and so on to get paid? There’s no journalism fairy that leaves news in the night. Do you expect them to work for free as a service to you?

[Maraya1969]

42. Like I said upthread. They can use advertising like most of them did a few years ago.

The last newspaper that required a subscription was Cincinnati Times, (Not sure of the name but it was Cincinnati). I cannot imagine subscribing to every small city newspaper in this country.

I'm just going to use the site that photocopies all of them

[BannonsLiver]

57. Advertising doesn't pay all of the freight.

You don’t know what you’re talking about. Basically what you want is other people’s labor for free because you place no value on that labor.

[mopinko]

19. a free story or 2 is a great way to get ppl to subscribe.

i finally broke down and subscribed to wapo cuz i kept hitting the paywall. same for esquire, cuz i need my charlie pierce. ntyt, i dont even bother to click, and they’ll never get a dime from me. same for chgo trib.
b like costco guys, give us some free samples.

[brooklynite]

20. So we now have armchair publishers who apparently know how to make money in the news business...

[mainer]

21. If only little newspapers would join one paywall pool

I’d be happy to subscribe to a nationwide small-newspaper pool if it meant I could get access to all. Then the newspapers could be paid out of that pool, based on # of site views.

[Arthur_Frain]

22. Well, I'd pay rather handsomely just to get a real newspaper back

If they’d employ local reporters and journalists. If they’d publish a complete sized newspaper where every story terminates in the paper, not just a paragraph tease them “for more info, logon to our website”. But we’re not going back to that model.

I view the death of my local newspaper as a lesson that everything free comes with a price. We were a much more tightly knit community back then, or at least it felt that way.

[Ferrets are Cool]

32. If they could keep the business open by selling newspapers, they would.

[tiredtoo]

23. Many home town newspapers have been taken over by corporate powers

Actually they are not really hometown newspapers any more. This is by design to have more control over the press. However the local newspapers are near extinction if your paper is really still local, you may want to pay to get it. We need factual news now more than ever.

[Silent Type]

26. I'm OK with local journalists wanting to get paid.

[Maraya1969]

47. Just checked and there are over 19,000 cities in the US. I don't mind paying for some

but it is not even feasible to pay for them all.

[BlueCheeseAgain]

27. My problem is when I realistically will only read one or two articles a month with each paper.

I'd gladly pay per article, or maybe for a monthly subscription to a large collection of news sources (with a limit on how many articles I can read). I wonder if there are any such consortiums forming, or if there are economic or legal reasons it can't be done.

[Maraya1969]

28. That's my issue too. How many times am I going to read the Cincinnati news? But they had one

article I wanted. So I can't read that unless I pay for a years subscription! Or a monthly one that I have to remember to cancel after a month

[LauraInLA]

35. As someone else mentioned, use archive.ph for an occasional single article EOM

[Maraya1969]

48. The problem with subscriptions for me is I sign up, and not just for newspapers and then

I forget who and where I signed up to. I saw there is a download now that will look around and find out all your subscriptions.

[tulipsandroses]

29. In defense of the news sites, they operate a business

I don’t think it’s a matter of greed. Just business. Businesses cannot survive without cash flow or profit. I think the problem is that we have been living under the false notion that the internet is free. And sure, lots of businesses made their content free initially. But no business can withstand giving away their product for free long term. It costs money to pay writers, editors, marketing, and many other things we the consumer take for granted. My suggestion is pick 1 or 2 sites that you like and subscribe to those sites only.

See the big tech companies had us fooled for a long time. There is and never was free internet. They have made huge profits giving us “free internet”

[Ferrets are Cool]

31. How else do they pay their employees?

Ads wont pay for it all.

[Maraya1969]

49. I didn't know that. Some sites are like a carnival with all the ads popping up. And then

you can only read the bottom 2 inches because they have something covering everything else.

I think I'm just going to subscribe to a couple, (like Wapo) and then quit bitching about it

[themaguffin]

34. LOCAL NEWSPAPERS ARE DYING. Do you have a business model that works?

[redqueen]

46. This! I am happy to pay for my local subscription

because we need them!

Imagine how much worse things could be with AI writing all the articles and the money men directing the AI

[Army Brat]

37. How much is a subscription?

I doubt it's much money. Local papers are vital.

[Kaleva]

38. Local newspapers are going the way of the rotary phone

Obsolete

I've been to township meeting where residents complained about not knowing about certain things. The board tells them that the notices were published in the local newspaper and the residents response saying that no one reads the papers.

[dalton99a]

39. Pretty soon you'll have to pay for weather information

or watch a bunch of crap first

FWIW YouTube is going that route with just about every fucking video clip

[Maraya1969]

50. I pay for Youtube Premium because I could not stand the ads. If you don't click on

that button that comes up after about a minute the ads are as long as QVC.

[Ferrets are Cool]

51. I did the same with YT premium because I go there A LOT and since doing so,

I've gotten my moneys worth x 100.

[AllaN01Bear]

54. internet providers and content providers are doing that now. yt started doing the adblocker thing several

months ago and is charging $10.00 to unblock the adds . i came from the era where there endless , mind numbing ads on the tv and the newspapers and magazines. my sis sez shed like to get paid she was a stunt woman in the biz rezids. nonsensical. the creators on yt were getting paid long before this .only 5% creators are millinares on yt. careful , or you yet may kill the goose which layed the golden egg.

[qwlauren35]

55. It May Be that Advertising Doesn't Work for Small Papers

It's possible that the readership of small papers does not interest advertisers. I don't think it's because papers are trying to net big profits. I think it's because they are trying to stay afloat.

Keep in mind that when you bought the paper at a newsstand, it was not free. Now that "paper" newspapers are virtually gone, there is a missing money source and it has to be compensated for.

If you were buying a paper every day for $1, then it should be okay to pay $30/month. If they are only charging $15/month, you're getting a bargain.

Please do the math before you complain.

[Maraya1969]

56. The problem is, how many $30 should I pay for in a month? I have paid for a lot of things

And I have donated to several sites that don't have subscriptions, (like Charity Navigator, Wikipedia etc.) Sites that I use a lot and that I feel like I should support them. But if there is one thing that I want to find out and I have to pay for a year's subscription..... I'm not going to do that. I am not a cheap person.

I'm just going to try and use the way back site and subscribe to WAPO.

[qwlauren35]

58. CNN is still free.

I think it makes sense to do one big one and one local one, which is what you would be doing in the paper age.

When I grew up, we did Washington Post and Newsweek, and that was it.

I have found that WaPo and NYT and WSJ all have, at least for intro, very reasonable prices, AND they send me a brief in my e-mail daily.

I also have some more expensive ones - Atlantic and Economist. I find their coverage more fact-based, but also aligned with my views.

My sister got me a subscription for Baltimore Banner, and I used to have Baltimore Sun. But local news can be very depressing. Lots of crime, arrests, bad schools, etc. So it's rare that I actually look at it. If it was my choice, I probably wouldn't subscribe.

I think you have to decide how you're going to get your news and then just stick with it. Block out the rest. I'm sure it's annoying that DU members post something and you can't read it without paying. But it's usually just a different spin on what's being covered on CNN. Which is still free.

It's kind of like when I see ads for shows that are on HBO. I don't subscribe. So I don't get to see them... and I accept that. It never occurred to me to complain that HBO was so expensive. I have Prime, I have Netflix, I have Disney/Marvel/StarWars, I have Paramount Plus, BritBox and BETPlus. But no HBO. You pick your battles.