Would You Pay for Mobile News Access?
The financially troubled New York Times is 
reportedly considering charging for access to the paper on mobile platforms. Martin Nisenholtz, head of the Times digital operations, said the Times is considering charging subscription fees for access to the paper from mobile devices such as the iPhone.
“Mobile offers a better opportunity for paid content,” Nisenholtz said in his remarks. “For publishers to offer their content for free in the mobile platform forever without getting paid very much money, I don’t think it’s going to be tenable.”
While it is understandable that mainstream media is struggling to come up with revenue opportunities to replace falling ad revenue, I’m not sure that a mobile access subscription is going to be a viable alternative. Consumers have become conditioned to grab their news online where it is free and it will be a hard sell to convince them otherwise. Would you pay to subscribe to the NYT on your phone?
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Nope. I wouldn’t pay to get news on my phone.
There’s really nothing that the NYT offers that can’t be had already for free.
Nope. Too much free news elseware on the web.
Maybe if the New York Times would write stories that were actually true and about things people are interested in then maybe people would actually buy the paper and their revenue would go up. Just an idea…
Nope.
No.
So, it’s free through desktop/laptop access, but if access through a smartphone, it’d cost?
More likely, we’ll see internet-based news services start charging subscription fees for access across the board, I think.
Except the people will revolt…
All is takes is for one site to put up the news for free, and the other sites will be screwed.
It makes far more sense for the NYT to try to differentiate themselves through op/ed and feature pieces that people would want to pay for, rather than rehashed AP pieces that you can get anywhere.
Well said, though I think this train of thought is a good starting point and needs to evolve from there.
The problem with that is, you can get the NYT editorial slant anywhere in the mainstream press.
Nope. Not going to pay for it, I’ll get my news from somewhere else.
Maybe but it would have to be a nominal fee.
People still read the NYT!??!!?! Oh, yeah, that’s why they are suffering financially… well that and their pitiful excuse for a writing staff.