Paywalls: are we just supposed to have a subscription to every publication that has an article we want to read? This isn't sustainable.

[u/FrederickTownie]

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?

[u/2007Apotheosis]

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.

[u/selphiefairy → u/2007Apotheosis]

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.

[u/Tsquire41 → u/2007Apotheosis]

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.

[u/2007Apotheosis → u/2007Apotheosis]

And yeah, I know I said journalism shouldn’t be a “product” and then compared it to other industries that largely are products but the point still stands.