To me, as to countless others, the New York Times represents something beyond the normal provincialism of American journalism: eclectic, diverse, informed, unique reportings and news-stories, day after day.
While many feel that the Times is blatantly left-of-the-center, I still think it provides one with extremely incisive and discriminating points of view.
My main interface with Times is with its online edition, magnificently produced and indefatigably updated, with crystal-clear visuals and easy-on-the-eyes text. The dreaded question on everyone's mind is of course, how long it can stay free.
The BusinessWeek article has this on the matter:
ONLINE, THE TIMES ALREADY is making serious money. New York Times Digital (which includes Boston.com as well as NYTimes.com) netted an enviable $17.3 million on revenues of $53.1 million during the first half of 2004, the last period for which its financials have been disclosed. All indications are that the digital unit is continuing to grow at 30% to 40% a year, making it NYT Co.'s fastest-revving growth engine.
Advertising accounts for almost all of the digital operation's revenues, but disagreement rages within the company over whether NYTimes.com should emulate The Wall Street Journal and begin charging a subscription fee. Undoubtedly, many of the site's 18 million unique monthly visitors would flee if hit with a $39.95 or even a $9.95 monthly charge. One camp within the NYT Co. argues that such a massive loss of Web traffic would cost the Times dearly in the long run, both by shrinking the audience for its journalism and by depriving it of untold millions in ad revenue. The counterargument is that the Times would more than make up for lost ad dollars by boosting circulation revenue -- both from online fees and new print subscriptions paid for by people who now read for free on the Web.
Sulzberger declines to take a side in this debate, but sounds as if he is leaning toward a pay site. "It gets to the issue of how comfortable are we training a generation of readers to get quality information for free," he says. "That is troubling."
Somehow the availability on the web of 'free' stuff does not to me seem an obsession of low-minded, miserly web-citizens who lust after freebies. It does not seem as endemic and dire as "training a generation of readers to get quality information for free," somehow...it has to do with the way the web evolved, the way services started out on the web, the way many services and software is still available, free...the way two web giants offer peerless service 'free' : Yahoo and Google, and it is all accepted unquestioningly, but also with some knowledge that these outfits have learnt how to make money by other innovative channels while still maintaining their free offerings and also staying afloat themselves...
I think the NYT is a very valuable resource (and immediately the statement engenders the obvious question: "Should we then not be ready to pay for it...?"), and if the online site is making money, supporting itself, it should continue doing so...but that is probably an unrealistic, utopian thought...is there an authoritative economics of 'free' goods on the web...
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