Newspaper Registration, Useless Stats And Dirty Data

from the so-what? dept

Just as various newspapers like the Houston Chronicle and the Toronto Star are realizing that having more traffic is generally a good thing -- and having registration required is a bad thing, the New York Times owned Boston.com is proudly talking up how it now has one million registered users and giving some stats about those users. Of course, by itself, that number is useless. They may have one million registered names, but you have no clue how much of it is dirty data. If they're selling that data to advertisers, they risk liability for providing false info. At the same time, there's no thought towards the opportunity costs. How many more pageviews would they have shown if they didn't have a registration gate blocking the entrance. Plenty of people probably get in with BugMeNot (showing five boston.com registrations as we post this), but lots of others probably just don't bother at all. Stating one million registered users is a meaningless milestone that makes you wonder what they're really measuring over there.
Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team


Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  • identicon
    Darin Codon, 20 Dec 2005 @ 8:11pm

    News we can Use

    Thanks Good Point and one you've brought up before. There are some big issues here for issues involving newspaper revenue and copyright considerations. Then again - arent' we the new newspaper? (I will eat your cookie if you remove your no follow tag) :0

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Jimmy, 20 Dec 2005 @ 11:43pm

    1 million names

    They need someone who can do something with those names. Like... how to add millions more high profile names. While makeing a ton of money. Maybe they can email me. (jimzztop57@Yahoo.com) I can help. Jim

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Nwahmaet, 21 Dec 2005 @ 1:45pm

    Registration is easily avoidable ...

    ... just disable cookies for boston.com.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Bruno Mesrine, 9 Mar 2007 @ 4:58am

    I am photographe and like little boy !

    link to this | view in chronology ]


Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.