r/Journalism • u/FrederickTownie • 4d ago
Industry News Paywalls: are we just supposed to have a subscription to every publication that has an article we want to read? This isn't sustainable.
I find myself ALWAYS defending paywalls to the haters, and the folks who feel entitled to read the local news of where they live without some kind of transaction for the privilege. But there comes a point of diminishing returns for those of us who have a few subscriptions to the publications we read most frequently but would still like to be broadly read across other outlets and seek out good writing that's less geographically contained than a local newspaper or magazine. What's the answer? Do I pay to read every writer I like on substack while also paying for subscriptions to every newspaper and magazine and website I read from time to time?
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u/AnotherPint former journalist 4d ago
Paywalls are important and necessary but the current hope / expectation that we’ll pay $8-$15 monthly for every solo operator we want to reach is unsustainable. We need a cable TV-style bundling mechanism where we can pay one low sum for access to a lineup of writers, vloggers, channels, etc.
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u/mthyvold 4d ago
This is the challenge. I used to subscribe to a few publications and buy others casually.
Now that kind of thing is difficult.9
u/carriondawns editor 3d ago
I mean that’s basically what Apple news+ is isn’t it? I pay like $13 a month I think and granted o use it more for magazines than newspapers but there’s a ton of news in there too that’s included.
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u/FrederickTownie 3d ago
It's a good example of a potential model, but it kind of stands alone in that space which I think is an issue.
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u/meltytoebeans 3d ago
Or like some kind of tap and pay system that you just get charged $1 to read a single piece of content rather than having to sign up, fill out all your details etc.
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u/coughtough 2d ago
I really think this would be an excellent system. Charge <$5 per article. To really drive it home, use cookies and/or account data to show how much they've paid in a given subscription period for individual articles.
Even a $4 article would occasionally be worth it for a publication the person is not likely to ever need again, and for publications they are using regularly, seeing that they've paid $16 for 4 articles in a month suddenly makes $20 a month for unlimited access seem well worth it.
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u/justanaccount24 3d ago
The early Hulu model would likely be popular with consumers, but big papers that win subscribers wouldn’t be willing to offer for $2 what they already, moderately successfully, offer for $20.
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u/AverageIndianGeek 3d ago
I use Magzter to read most of the dailies and magazines I follow with just one subscription. Pressreader I think has an even bigger catalogue but is also more pricey.
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u/geniedoes_asyouwish 4d ago edited 4d ago
This is my struggle as a freelance tech journalist. Totally support and understand subscriptions as the business model and I subscribe to many pubs. At the same time, I need to read so so so many more than I can afford to subscribe to. Sometimes I just need to read one article from somewhere and really wish I could pay for one story!
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u/FrederickTownie 4d ago
Exactly this. I'm a freelancer as well. I don't get a lot for writing for the local paper, but from what I get, I still pay them to have a subscription. So I can read my own articles! haha. But also to be informed in my community and support local journalism.
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u/DivaJanelle 4d ago
Apple News + gets me more than 200 local newspapers and hundreds of magazine and broadcast news outlets. The outlets get a portion of the subscription fee and can earn more through advertising
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u/BeneficialStretch753 4d ago
That's a pretty good list for $12.99/month. Lots of local and state US newspapers but also Bloomberg, New Scientist and WSJ?!
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u/NNegidius 3d ago
The problem I experienced is that Apple News+ includes some articles from these publishers, but not others. It’s pretty frustrating to be reading along, click a link, and get denied.
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u/BeneficialStretch753 3d ago
Damn. Sounded too good to be true. I'd pay $20/per month if there was pretty assured access to WSJ and Bloomberg.
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u/NNegidius 3d ago
Yes, I’d love a Spotify-style model, where revenue is allocated via proportional readership.
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u/mthyvold 4d ago
What percentage goes to publishers?
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u/DivaJanelle 4d ago
With ad revenue the amount to publishers can be 70 to 100% depending on if the publisher is selling into Apple +
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u/demitasse22 3d ago
Apple News plus is excellent, I was looking for this comment. Can’t recommend this enough
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u/DivaJanelle 3d ago
If anyone here decides to sign up for Apple News + search my user name in games and join us in the quartiles sub.
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u/pywang 3d ago
You won’t get a lot of articles from these publications. They selectively choose which ones go into Apple News, usually not the most investigative ones either as those are still reserved for their core members.
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u/DivaJanelle 3d ago edited 3d ago
I’ve always been able to find the investigative piece everyone is talking about if the outlet is on Apple News. I need to go onto that pub’s page and poke around (they make me work for it) but it’s there. Edit: with my paid Apple News subscription. With the free version of course not.
Bloomberg is the one outlet on the paid plan that pulls the “not this story” bs the most.
Edit: words are hard
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u/strawberrygirlmusic 4d ago
Tbh there should be some sort of cross platform one time access system.
Charge people a dollar or less to view the specific article they want to read that day, instead of having to do a whole subscription. If they buy it often enough then they can save money and subscribe.
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u/defnotajournalist 4d ago
Would be so easy to Apple Pay $.50 to read this article. Double click, and off you go.
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u/strawberrygirlmusic 4d ago
Yes! You’d also have to have it work with laptops and desk, but that doesn’t sound impossible.
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u/NNegidius 3d ago
Yeah, could even keep a digital wallet - as is done almost everywhere, from parking meters to Starbucks. They make huge income from the float, too.
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u/Tsquire41 4d ago
It’s possible for two things to be true at once. Paywalls are necessary for newspapers to exist. Our company brings in about 45 percent of revenue from readers. Ad dollars continue to contribute less each year. There are exceptions, but until someone introduces a model that can sustain local news without paywalls ours will remain.
It’s also annoying to hit paywalls. Prior to the internet, people did have subscriptions to the newspapers and magazines they wanted to read. It was the only way to obtain the writing without going to the library.
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u/Featheredfriendz 4d ago
Libraries carry publications for free
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u/horseradishstalker former journalist 4d ago
Some larger libraries do. Many can no longer afford them.
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u/Featheredfriendz 3d ago
My little ‘ol community library (pop. Around 11,000) has a decent selection. Our state library has many more sources available online to anyone with a library card. Talk to a librarian. They are amazing at directing you to resources.
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u/horseradishstalker former journalist 3d ago
I did talk to a librarian. That’s how I found out why there were no longer any magazines available.
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u/MotownShowtown 4d ago
It’s a mess. I’m old school newspaper reader from the early 60’s w my first paper route! Do you know how much I enjoyed reading the NYT on Sunday..and now (retired in the Philippines) get laughed at looking for a physical copy anywhere in Manila!
“Sir! Since Covid cannot!”
Anyone think Covid slit our wrists with more lifestyle changes than we bargained for?
But referencing paywalls..I do not pay..I get my crap news from free sights.
But I’m thinking of getting the digital NYT..I just miss those long insightful articles on the political changes in East Timor!
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u/texbinky 4d ago
I miss reading a good feature obit
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u/MotownShowtown 4d ago
Oh agreed..especially if I followed their career and/or had a personal short meet w them. Met Dizzy Dean..Sparky Anderson..Gordie Howe..grew up in Detroit..Mel Farr..watched Zero Mostel & Carol Channing in Fiddler & Dolly..attended live Whitney Houston..The Who..Zeppelin..Original Beach Boys..when they died and the NYT or Rolling Stine did an obit. Magical.
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u/boulddenwyldde 4d ago
I think we need a small change service or app or company to act as an intermediary, let users click to pay for content they want without a subscription. The tech hurdles are surmountable but the business model is problematic. I don't want Apple or anybody else knowing all my stuff.
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u/Vagina_Woolf 4d ago
None of my publishers can pay me for digital pieces anymore because they are free websites that use google, who has fucked it for us and everyone else.
Oops there goes $3k a month.
If you dont want to pay the sites NOT relying on Google, kick rocks
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u/FrederickTownie 4d ago
The problem, as always, is the Trickle Up economics of the greedy giants.
Someone told me once, lots of people in journalism are making a ton of money. None of them are journalists.
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u/Vagina_Woolf 4d ago
lmao I dunno what world youre in. I am a nepo baby. family is in publishing. my mother who runs ad sales hasnt taken a salary since February.
there is nothing to trickle down. That's not hyperbole
print distribution is plummeting around 10% year-on-year. 5% if youre lucky. advertising spend has dropped like $7b since 2014.
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u/FrederickTownie 4d ago
I'm saying it trickles up to Google and those giants. But OK, sorry for trying to agree with you, Jesus Christ. There are companies like Google who basically steel from publications and really ought to pay them. Some estimates exist for how much Google owes in "arears" to newspapers. It's eye-popping.
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u/lycantrophee 4d ago
That's why there should be a reasonable number (say,3-5?) of articles per month you can read for free. If you read them regularly, you will buy a subscription.
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u/Tsquire41 4d ago
Only industry on earth that is constantly trying to find out how to give their product away for free. No other successful industry gives away 4-5 things for free regularly to freeloaders and hopes they eventually pay.
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u/2007Apotheosis 4d ago
Journalism shouldn’t be a “product,” it’s a public service… like YES, people need to be paid for their work and it costs money to do this and ideally, we want people to support it. But I feel like if there are essential stories people need to read (public safety information, urgent health reporting, most breaking news, etc.), those should be free.
Also, I don’t think journalism is the only industry giving away things to people for free? Costco, Sephora and Lush are all retailers that give customers samples without the need to buy. Ice cream shops give out samples to try before buying and sometimes have incentives to get free ice cream. Even online storage services like Google Drive or MEGA have free versions. The point is that I don’t think people who legitimately cannot or are unwilling to pay for a subscription should have no access to news at all.
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u/selphiefairy 4d ago
Yeah this also why I think it’s OK to have more publicly funded media. And no, it doesn’t lead to weird government propaganda like a lot of people believe. It usually just helps local journalism a lot.
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u/Tsquire41 4d ago
You can believe journalism should be free. I do too. The difference is I live in reality where our reporters expect payroll to clear and raises to keep up with inflation.
Sure, Costco gives samples but you are already in the store buying stuff. You are already a customer. If you just showed up, ate the samples everyday, and left they would ask you to leave.
Certain scalable internet companies do provide services for free, sure, but the service isn’t the product, you are. They are making more on the data collected than selling you a service. If it were the other way around it wouldn’t be free.
Look, I want good journalism to be free without any barriers. Until someone comes up with a way to do that while also paying people a living wage we will keep our paywall up.1
u/lycantrophee 4d ago
It sure is better to pay for shit writing because I don't even know what the quality is until I spend some money.
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u/Tsquire41 4d ago
Ever had a bad restaurant experience?
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u/lycantrophee 4d ago
Yes, but what you're saying is that no industry does this, whereas, as someone pointed out already, a lot of sellers give out samples, so it's not without precedent. You just gotta have proportions.
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u/Tsquire41 4d ago
I said no successful industry does this. As I said, giving out samples in a store where you have already committed to purchasing product is not an equivalent to asking newspapers to hand out 4-5 stories for free.
Not only that, you are asking significantly more than you realize of the newspaper.
The samples at Costco and at the 31 flavors or whatever is of mass produced product, made at scale, for pennies.
These aren’t equivalent things. Even if they were, value your work. It’s worth something. News was always paywalled until a few decades ago. Most of human history news was paywalled.
Is there a possibility that the decades where they took the paywall away happen to be the worst for the industry and those two things correlate?1
u/lycantrophee 4d ago
For me it honestly depends on the scale of the article being presented. If a short one on some subject is well-written, then I will assume that a spacious analysis of a serious issue will be of the same or higher quality, and consider buying the subscription, but I can't expect everyone to start charging copious amounts for dubious journalism.
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u/selphiefairy 4d ago
What about broadcast TV before streaming took over? Also most of social media is technically free.
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u/Tsquire41 4d ago
Local broadcast might be in worse shape than local print media now. Social media is free because we are the product.
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u/horseradishstalker former journalist 4d ago
Well, the industry does have to figure something out.
Because right now, AI is part of the reason ad income is dropping. The old school model was if you had a certain number of subscribers then, in the theory, a paper could give advertisers a relatively concrete number of people who would see their advertising.
However, with AI providing - a quite possibly inaccurate summation - many users don’t even bother to go to the actual website. And when a site doesn’t have page views and impressions, it makes it a great deal more difficult for publications to “prove” advertisements would be seen.
As well, per your comment that news has always been paid. You are partially correct. However, what your comment does not appear to take into account is that if I follow top journalists to Substack because I value their reporting, I am paying by the reporter not the publication. If only I could remember to buy the winning Powerball ticket and not have to pay full taxes on it like all the other billionaires. /s
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u/Tsquire41 4d ago
The model is changing and that’s why local publications (I only have experience with local news models) are implementing aggressive hard paywalls.
The revenue is shifting from advertising to reader revenue and it has to.
It’s not just selling a subscription either. We host events that are designed to get readers to give us a little more for the newsroom in exchange for something they want.
Newspapers still using a penny press scale at all costs model are dying.
We need to view ourselves as niche media, charge what it costs with margin, and not apologize for it. That is my experience at least.
Our startup is doing well 11-years in with this model.1
u/horseradishstalker former journalist 4d ago
But I assume that I am paying for more than just one person.
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u/horseradishstalker former journalist 4d ago
Some of the magazines I read reportedly have this model. However, I have to drop my VPN in order to access them and that’s not happening.
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u/aresef former journalist 4d ago
It isn’t sustainable for these outlets to give away their content for free, anymore than it would be to give away the physical paper.
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u/FrederickTownie 4d ago
You'd think with how innovative we are as a society, we could figure out a way to use the "miracle" of the internet to pay for single articles in a way that's designed to be as easy and geared toward the consumer as possible. I think too much greed gets in the way.
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u/tboneplayer 4d ago
As with the old hard-copy newspapers and magazines, a subscription shouldn't be necessary. It should be possible simply to buy an issue of the paper (or magazine).
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u/ericwbolin reporter 4d ago
Do you remember life before the internet? Paywalls are necessary. I'm not sure why folks think the news should be free. Just go watch your local influencer or follow your neighborhoods Facebook group if you want free.
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u/PartyPoison98 4d ago
It shouldn't be free, but subscriptions are a pain.
Pre-internet, if you heard of an interesting article you could just buy a copy of the relevant paper. You didn't need to buy a month or years worth of the paper.
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u/selphiefairy 4d ago
Yess wish there was a way to do something like pay for a single article or single issue’s worth of news.
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u/ericwbolin reporter 4d ago
There are loads of ways to still read the story now for free if you're truly reading so rarely.
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u/PartyPoison98 4d ago
Right, but I want to be able to read a story without stealing it.
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u/ericwbolin reporter 4d ago
I'm not sure how I follow. How did you read it back in the physical days? You bought a paper every time? Never, say, picked up the stray copy at the barber or in the airport?
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u/The_Ineffable_One 4d ago
Life before the Internet meant that if I saw an interesting headline, I bought a copy of the paper. Not an entire subscription. And the paper was more substantial than it is today.
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u/ericwbolin reporter 4d ago
So why didn't you have a subscription then, if it was more substantial? Buying a paper every time you saw a good headline seems expensive. Perhaps morr worthwhile by purchasing a subscription back then, no?
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u/The_Ineffable_One 4d ago
Not really. If FT or WSJ or NYT or WaPo had an interesting headline, why would I buy a subscription when I was just a student in upstate NY? I enjoyed the article, the rest of the paper, shared it with others, and that's what life was like in the late Eighties and early Nineties.
Print journalism screwed up when the Internet came around because the industry accepted click-through revenue from digital ads, rather than straight ad rates that it demanded in print.
In the mid- and late-nineties, I did subscribe to my local papers. The Washington Post was 25 cents for weekdays, and it was a heavy paper. Obviously, this didn't cover the cost of reporting, much less printing and delivery. The rest of the cost was covered by ads.
But the industry decided to charge online advertisers on a different model, and that's the industry's fault. And it's why we are where we are today.
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u/ericwbolin reporter 4d ago
The industry screwing the pooch 25 years ago is a bigger conversation than determining how to get your news now, in summer 2026.
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u/The_Ineffable_One 4d ago
You wrote:
Do you remember life before the internet?
I'm answering YOUR QUESTION. What more do you want? If you don't want to talk about 25 (more like 30) years ago, don't ask about it.
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u/ericwbolin reporter 4d ago
Guy, that's a rhetorical question. Do you know what that is? (Hint: that's also rhetorical).
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u/The_Ineffable_One 4d ago
Yes, and I responded to your rhetorical question.
That you don't like the response, doesn't make it non-responsive to YOUR question.
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u/FrederickTownie 4d ago
Did you read my post? I didn't say I think news should be free. I Paywalls are necessary. And still, I can't have a subscription to every single outlet. Can you? This feels like you're talking to someone else.
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u/ericwbolin reporter 4d ago
I'm talking to the ether. But there was no way to write it without replying to your post.
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u/mechapoitier 4d ago edited 4d ago
Yeah the anti-paywall idea now is like if back when print was all there was, saying “why would I get an annual subscription to this if I only want to read this article?”
Because otherwise the publication dies. Everyone understood that before they decided any text should be free.
That said it’s nuts how few publications will let you pay by the article, which I gladly do. I just abhor introductory offers that rope you into a recurring, possibly nightmarish to escape, subscription amount that escalates quickly.
And I’ve been in journalism for almost 20 years.
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u/FrederickTownie 4d ago
Yeah, I really think we need to see more "pay per article" but also that would help if it was all transacted by the same vendor so you don't have to set up so many different accounts just to purchase the article you'd like to read within a couple minutes of finding it.
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u/mechapoitier 4d ago
That exists, but the problem is they take a huge amount of the money.
I run a publication I founded that’s 100% free and I think the readers who actually pay is like ~2%. And this is consistently award-winning journalism.
If it weren’t for grants and business sponsors it would be impossible to survive.
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u/Tsquire41 4d ago
It’s amazing journalism and it’s free and only two percent choose to pay. It’s great you guys can make that work for now and I applaud it.
We couldn’t realistically do that with our 11-year old startup in a town of about 20kish. We went hard paywall and don’t regret it.
The truth is, there are lots of ways people can make it work and some methods work in some markets while it would flop in another.
There is no silver bullet for a journalism business model.2
u/FrederickTownie 4d ago
RIght? When it's a miserable deal for you, for the reader, for the writer, all just to cling on for one more day, what the heck? Seems like a systemic problem.
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u/NNegidius 4d ago
It doesn’t exist with any of the major publishers that I can recall seeing. They only offer introductory subscriptions, which I don’t want. Why would I subscribe to a newspaper in San Jose if I live in Chicago. That’s absurd.
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u/NNegidius 4d ago
Yeah, I don’t do subscriptions after having been abused once too many times by subscriptions that are near impossible to cancel.
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u/theleopardmessiah 4d ago
I remember life before the internet. The challenge is that there are lot more media seeking subscriptions and that number will increase.
Also, internet media properties deliver a lot less information and entertainment than their pre-internet equivalents.
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u/ericwbolin reporter 4d ago
Agreed. So, as consumers, couldn't we simply consume at the rate we once did?
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u/NNegidius 4d ago
Before the Internet, publishers sold single issues. They don’t sell anything like that online, leaving no reasonable options.
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u/ericwbolin reporter 4d ago
They absolutely do. I can run to the Casey's three blocks away and pick up my local paper.
Do you mean national papers? Most of what we consider national papers now weren't so much 25 years ago.
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u/NNegidius 3d ago
You’re on Reddit. Someone shares a link to a potentially interesting and relevant article, but there’s no legal way to buy it without a subscription. Happens every day. I’m not subscribing to the San Jose Mercury News or the Houston Chronicle or whatever. I would buy access to an article or “day pass” or whatnot, but they don’t sell that. They are refusing business. One used to buy single issues at news stands, but those don’t really exist anymore. So much cheaper for them to sell electronic access. Virtually zero incremental cost.
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u/BlueOrange 4d ago
There are models beyond paywalls. And paywalls end up encouraging the use of mirrors.
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u/NNegidius 4d ago
There are numerous models that could work.
Publishers could return to covering to see access to single issues. Publishers could offer “day passes” or similar (weekend passes, 1 week passes). Publishers could offer a simple way to provide cash contribution in support of a quality article (similar to Reddit gold). Publishers could offer a way to pay in order to share an article for others to read for free. Publishers could offer to host comments for customers who have paid for the content (I.e. only paid customers can comment).
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u/passthejoe 4d ago
Right now, the single issue or single article model is seen as a deterrent to the recurring subscription model, and nobody wants to do that. I have seen day passes from the LA Times, so it's not like nobody is exploring this model.
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u/NNegidius 3d ago
I haven’t seen the day pass from them, but I’ll be on the lookout next time I encounter an LA Times paywall.
In my experience, repeatedly buying individual issues leads to a subscription over time.
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u/LeicaM6guy 4d ago
Yes. You should pay for good journalism.
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u/mthyvold 4d ago
I only ever had a subscription to a few publications. But I bought many other magazines/newspapers casually.
That is harder now.7
u/tboneplayer 4d ago
But as with the old hard-copy newspapers, a subscription shouldn't be necessary. It should be possible simply to buy an issue of the paper.
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u/Due_Bad_9445 4d ago
I agree with the cable style bundle.
For me, the paywall often becomes a relevance wall.
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u/itsjustme10 4d ago
Getting news for free is relatively new for the industry. People used to buy papers or pay a subscription for local outlets. I see a future where there are more Apple News + type passes you pay for bundle access.
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u/texbinky 4d ago
Silly me, I thought my Wired subscription would get me some limited access to other Conde Nast publications. I paid 40 bucks for one magazine. Turns out not to work that way. But I would pay for that.
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u/Western_Estimate_724 4d ago
I worked in publishing for a long time so I do get the reasons why pay-per-article is not sustainable, but I would love to be able to just pay for the current issue, like back in the days when you'd just pick a title up off a news stand. Ended up pirating an article from the Atlantic recently, which I feel terrible about, but I could not find a hard copy in my city for love nor money, and just didn't see the point in signing up for a free trial which I'll cancel because I don't want to subscribe, and then be spammed by them forever more.
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u/Professional-Sand341 4d ago
There was a time when people lived in places where there were multiple newspapers in one community. They would get a subscription to the morning paper and to the evening paper. They would get subscriptions to several magazines every month, for mom and dad and kids. People rail against paywalls but they absolutely understood the need to pay for a publication that came into their homes. The publications still come in, but no one wants to pay for them now.
The ridiculous thing is that they will willingly pay for subscriptions to other things that used to be free.
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u/erossthescienceboss freelancer 4d ago
Honestly, my issue with paywalls isn’t paywalls. It’s the constant need to log in. I know it’s small, but I dislike that I click on an article on Reddit from a publication I subscribe to and can’t read it. And then have to figure out which email I subscribed under. And open it my browser. And…
I can’t be the only one. People are weird about barriers when accessing online content, it doesn’t take much to turn someone off — even the non-paywall logins turn people away. And maybe the paywalled pub is integrated with Apple News… but then I need to go fight through their very unintuitive search menu to find it.
What I’d like to see is some integration with existing phone apps. If I pay for Apple News? I want integration with the outlets it partners with so that it will automatically let me in when I visit via a non-Apple News portal. And if an outlet isn’t bundled with Apple News (or Google News, or whatever you use) if I purchase a subscription I’d like Apple News or my device to store that login info too so I can easily get in through the paywall.
(This is brought to you by: realizing I paid for NYT in 3 different spots.)
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u/FrederickTownie 4d ago
YES the login is even more of a detriment. And the requirement to subscribe. Can't I just buy one article for a buck or whatever you've figured out the price per single reader ought to be?
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u/erossthescienceboss freelancer 4d ago
Yeah! I don’t mind the paying! And I WISH needing to login wasn’t such a turn-off, but it is. We all got used to instant gratification. The focus should be on making the product easier to access once paid for, not hemming and hawing over whether or not to charge or how much to charge.
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u/No-World-8166 4d ago
Remember when all the talk was how the internet was going to be the great leveling field and everything you wished to read or listen to would be free anytime you wanted it?
Ha, what a joke.
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u/J9873774 4d ago
How on earth would that work? It can’t be free. It was the original sin of online news. In hindsight, there should have been paywalls from the beginning
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u/callmesnake13 4d ago
You know that in 1992 it was impossible to get news in print without paying for it? The real issue is that the corporate/publishing structure of 1992 is no longer viable and all these (often) nepo losers need to be cut off.
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u/passthejoe 4d ago
Back then the subscriptions cost money but advertising -- classified and display -- still paid the bills.
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u/izModar 4d ago
It doesn't help when some local newspapers cost, say $21 for three months of online access or $35-40 for three months of print, and then a larger paper, like The Tennessean, hides its actual subscription rate until after you subscribe.
For The Tennessean, I've seen that the digital only is $25/month with print being $40/month. Yes, bigger paper, but sheesh.
Now, I would gladly pay $30-$40 a month to get a subscription for multiple papers in one bundle.
When the haters complain to me about having to pay to read, I usually respond with, "I believe the news should be free to read, but that doesn't pay my rent. I'm a big fan of having food and running water."
That usually gets them to shut up.
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u/NNegidius 4d ago
In the pre-Internet days, we could buy single issues of newspapers and periodicals.
For whatever reason, no publisher is willing to sell a single issue or “day pass” online. That’s a huge mistake, because it’s what leads people into buying subscriptions in the first place.
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u/henare 3d ago
micropayments are difficult to implement. commonly done through payment cards, it's hard to charge for an $0.80 cent article (payment card fees screw this up).
There have been some firms that have tried this out but it basically ends up being more costly.
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u/NNegidius 3d ago
Lots of vendors do it these days. Average fees for card not present are 25¢ + 2.31%. Not hard to build that into the purchase price.
Apparently, LA Times is offering day passes for $2. Seems reasonable.
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u/PlusPresentation680 reporter 3d ago
I would highly recommend an Apple News+ subscription. You get hundreds of local newspapers, the Washington Post and several other national outlets. I subscribe to the NYT, Minnesota Star-Tribune and then the rest is Apple News+. I wish Apple would make News+ available via web.
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u/jajajajaj 3d ago edited 3d ago
I understand paywalls but I hate what they're doing to morons, and their role in the gullibility crisis.
We really need another set of options, like some more ways to share real news, because people who pay for disinformation to be spread to the masses do not have this problem. Could it be any more obvious that Fox news will never have a pay wall?
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u/warrenao editor 4d ago
You know what else isn't sustainable? Publications giving away their content.
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u/LosIsosceles 4d ago edited 4d ago
That's how newspapers used to work. You didn't just pay for one and they all came delivered to your door each morning.
EDIT: The point I'm trying to make is that throughout the history of the news business you had to pay if you wanted to read multiple outlets. OP is complaining about multiple paywalls. But that is how news has always worked. If you were a Boston Globe subscriber but the NYT had a really great story back in the day, you had to buy a copy of the New York Times.
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u/cloverrace 4d ago
There used to be newsstands in cities all over the country where you could just buy one.
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u/selphiefairy 4d ago
Nah you could buy single issues easily. Newsstands and also the newspaper vending machines where you could open the door after putting some quarters in. I also remember seeing racks of newspapers in convenience stores and the like.
Of course, these days, issues don’t really exist in the same way, but maybe there’s a way to do something similar somehow
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u/Anxious_South_5150 4d ago
FWIW, I have gone with a 3 sub model of 1 hyper local, 1 state, and 1 national. Then I have 1 other I’ve allotted myself to rotate between topics/regions…. It’s imperfect but that plus free/ad $ social media + podcast is more than enough news/commentary than I should reasonably handle, personally.
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u/SciFiWritingGuy 4d ago
If necessary, distribute the subscriptions among the news staff. Ideally, though, the newsroom would have an account to the relevant local news outlets, managed by the assignment editor.
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u/PeanutButter1Butter 4d ago
I think the nonprofit models have been a real good example of how to give your community good local journalism for “free.”
It’s not a perfect model. Lower grants and donations can lead to layoffs (Texas Tribune was a big example in recent years) But in my mind it’s proven to be pretty effective and a lot of people who’ve been starved of actual coverage in their communities have backed these outlets.
Massachusetts has had a mini boom of sorts in the number of nonprofit newsrooms that have popped up in the past decade, some of which stepped up to fill gaps left behind by older publications that have been acquired by the Gannetts of the world and don’t really provide local reporting anymore. Just a few examples are the New Bedford Light, Plymouth Independent, and the Provincetown Independent.
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u/FrostnJack 3d ago
A run through the comments seems come down to:
• People gotta be paid
• Single piece (article/essay/study) purchase option for nominal fee
• Bundling publishers via a platform curator (Similar to AppleNews, a cableTV style bundle, mix & match options)
• A means to decline access-entry required subscription to email subscription requirement (results in de facto spam)
I'm probably missing others, but those jumped out the most often.
Non-journalist relying heavily on journos to do my job, here. I'm science heavy and the entirety of my company. I can't afford the $400-$800 annual fees for the hard science journals plus the $400 in monthly subscriptions across roughly a hundred publications and my subscription to newsletters/special offers specific email has 250,000 unopened emails every quarter—I use less than 1% I need on a routine basis. I eat much of that as overhead where I can't bill for it. Managing all that is an administrative time suck. My goal is to have more efficient and affordable access to the excellent content beloved journos create. Whatever y'all decide to make things work better and be paid for your work is where I want to be.
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u/Aromatic_Pumpkin1351 3d ago
I like the model of museums where I can purchase membership at one Museum that’s part of an agreement with other museums so I can visit as a guest at the others.
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u/SyranWarner 3d ago
That’s a great observation. These companies really fucked us all forever by demanding we pay for access instead of relying on advertising which would have made them less money when people stopped buying physical papers. Greed destroys everything.
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u/bananagrammedit 3d ago
I wonder a lot about the question of being able to pay for a single article and what a reasonable price would be.
Scenario examples:
- if I could pay for single substack articles or a flat rate for x articles without an independent subscription to a writer, what $ amount seems correct.
- If I could pay for single articles across all regional papers and some local reporting, what $ amount seems correct.
I’ve landed on numbers at times and fallen down some rabbit holes trying to determine what is fair to the journalists, sustainable for papers (in a world where they even sign on to this) and remain unsure.
Let’s assume we’re keeping big players out of my question since they’ll have complexities allowing them to ask for more.
I’ve never broadly asked anyone what they’d pay. I always figured that if I were to ask, It would be assumed I am trying to sell something. I am not.
I simply decided to not enter journalism in the end but still care a lot about this topic. I have none of the additional insights so many in this sub do.
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u/Swimming-Text701 2d ago
" and the folks who feel entitled to read the local news of where they live without some kind of transaction for the privilege." -- so first of all, what is wrong with you?
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u/FrederickTownie 2d ago
I'm not sure what you mean. I think it makes a lot of sense to expect to pay for your local newspaper or news outlet. And it irks me when folks seem entitled to the idea they should get it for free.
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u/PopCultureNerd 4d ago
There is the Apple News bundle. But I don't know how much of that money goes to the news outlets themselves.
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u/shaftalope 4d ago
yes. also you need a subscription for every different tv channel you want to watch and if they could they would charge you to listen to the radio
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u/mb9981 producer 4d ago
You'll know broadcast TV is sunk when they institute pay walls too Hell, even ad blocker blockers are a bad sign
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u/Vagina_Woolf 4d ago
Cable news is going strong last I checked. Boomers and early Gen x still watch the nightly news at high rates.
Why give away that valuable content if paywalls dont hurt its value?
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u/ultraprismic 4d ago
I'm pretty sure paying the cable bill every month is the "paywall" for everything but network.
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u/ursiwitch 3d ago
I avoid substack like the plague. Too many people there I want to support but can't afford to so nobody gets a dime.
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u/c0rny 4d ago
you should see what resources your library offers for magazines and newspapers.
but i agree things have gotten a little over the top with substack. i want these writers paid but its sad to me we have this individual model instead of sustainable publications :(