NYTimes Columnists Telling Readers How To Get Around The Paywall
from the they-don't-want-to-be-hidden dept
As we learned the last time the NY Times blocked its esteemed columnists off behind a paywall, those columnists really don't like being cut out of the conversation. So it's somewhat amusing, in the wake of the new paywall announcement, that star columnist Paul Krugman is already telling readers how to get around the paywall. Since it will be free to visit stories if you come in from elsewhere, Krugman is telling people an easy way to do so:But for those who haven't [subscribed], arriving at this blog via links won't count against your ration of free nytimes.com views. As I understand it, for example, you can come in via my automated Twitter feed; and of course clicking on links at Mark Thoma or other blogs will also work.Of course, in thinking about this, you have to wonder if there are going to be additional unintended consequences for the Times. For example, its home page is going to lose a lot of value, because each click now has a significant "cost." However, if you were to browse another site... say, one some third party set up that linked to the Times' articles, you could click those links without that cost. Your basic economics has to say that this harms the Times' own site while opening up opportunities for third parties to collect that traffic. It would be interesting if a Nobel Prize winning economist... such as Paul Krugman... decided to make that point to the geniuses in upper management at the NY Times.
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Filed Under: paul krugman, paywall
Companies: ny times
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There is a website I go to that every Saturday and Sunday, when news is slow, they put in a NYT link to some article that goes straight to the paywall and no where else. I assume it to be some of the NYT staff doing it to drive business. I go copy the title, paste it in the search engine and someone always has it up then or in a few hours. This allows access straight through to the article.
I would recommend that NYT stop that allowing linking to come in. Otherwise their precious paywall doesn't do much good. If they do, other than to NYC, they will become irrelevant as a news producer.
I certainly won't go through their paywall as a paying customer because other than the occasional article there is no interest in the NYT and if I can find it elsewhere, I won't even go with the link allowed.
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I suggest that you don't hold your breath while waiting.
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And that's why this will be a 'success'.
There will probably be a small dip in readership, but I doubt it will be really noticeable in the long slow demise of the paper.
The NYT will be able to claim 'the paywall works!' publicly, while to the advertisers they'll show that traffic really hasn't gone down much even if they didn't get many subscribers.
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What if the actual situation is not that the NY Times management wants a paywall... but that their shareholders are demanding a paywall because they're desperate for returns on what is no longer a good investment.
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like a toll bridge
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They're in a bid alright
There's an old army saying -- when the map and terrain disagree, trust the terrain.
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Huh, thats a Paywall?
Marketed at Fat Rats who don't know how to Sniff & Nibble.
Or was that Fat Cats?
The lack of resources always tend to make one resourceful.
For those with too much money not enough brains, try some Swiss Paywall......YUM YUM!
Who said there wasn't money in CON-Venience?
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If arriving at NYT from a link doesn't count as one of your "limited" visit...
what's stopping someone setting up a pure portal page for all the NYT article? And if you want to avoid NYT catching you, you can link to all the articles in the web that links to the NYT page you want?
So in essence, did NYT just gave up all their potential traffic and revenue on their pages to 2nd/3rd party news sites/agencies?
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existing wall vs coming paywall
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Paul Krugman, eh?
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Clarification on paywall
I have seen a post from a Canadian that confirms that the paywall implementation is no different then what I am seeing now. This means the paywall is easily bypassed and they are depending on most people not bypassing it via ignorance, laziness, guilt, or goodwill. I think they intend it to work like shareware.
Whatever the case, the thing that flabbergasts me the most is the $40 million cost. I just can't believe it would take that much to implement a paywall.
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Re: Clarification on paywall
Nope. According to the NYT, such side doors do NOT count against the 20.
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Re: Re: Clarification on paywall
http://www.nytimes.com/content/help/account/purchases/subscriptions-and-purchases.html
Visit ors can enjoy 20 free articles (including blog posts, slide shows, video and other multimedia features) each calendar month on NYTimes.com, as well as unrestricted access to browse the home page, section fronts, blog fronts and classifieds.
Yes. We encourage links from Facebook, Twitter, search engines, blogs and social media. When you visit NYTimes.com through a link from one of these channels, that article (or video, slide show, etc.) will count toward your monthly limit of 20 free articles, but you will still be able to view it even if you've already read your 20 free articles.
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I think I was reading too quickly. So, Yeah, it looks like a very generous policy for free reads. I think despite all the gloom and doom about how this will fail it looks the Times is bending over backwards to not drive away any readers that don't want to pay or pay as much as they are currently asking. The generous free reading policy is complemented by the ability to just delete cookies to zero out your monthly article count.
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Re: Re: Clarification on paywall
When you visit NYTimes.com by clicking links in search results, you'll have a daily limit of 5 free articles. This limit applies to the majority of search engines.
If you have an unlimited access via search engine links, why would they say this? We'll just have to test it when it rolls out to really understand. Maybe one of you Canucks knows if you can get off that snowmobile.
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Ha! Krugman stopped being a serious economist a long time ago - now hes just a sellout for a fat paycheck and writes to defend whatever position the times wants him too .... which, is his choice and I don't really blame him. mmmmm fat paycheck.
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Cookies? Mine get deleted every time the browser closes. IP? That gets changed at least twice a month. Maybe magic fairy dust will work.
However I am more tempted to do as several others have already mentioned, use Adblock to solve the whole thing for them.
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Paul Krugman behind paywall...
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https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/remove-cookies-for-site/
Once you reach your 20 article limit just right click your mouse and left click remove cookies for site. Presto you can now read another 20 articles.
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