Radio Open Source Takes On TimesSelect

Interesting chat Wednesday night courtesy of Chris Lydon and the team at Radio Openn Source. I was the go-to guest for business model questions. The best part for me were the calls and listening to the others: Jay Rosen of NYU/PressThink; Rich Meislin of the Times; Ben Hammersley of the Guardian. Rich said the site is holding on to 95 percent of the TimesSelect trial subscribers after the 14-day freebie but no concrete numbers. Jay reminded listeners there’s no inherent right for free content but added, “there’s no inherent right to charge, either.” He perceives value in ubiquity; I’m not sure that holds true in every case but a caller sounded a similar theme, saying “the more exclusive you get with paid content, the more irrelevant you become.”
Very cool to watch comments flowing in on the Radio Open Source site while the show was underway. If you get a chance, please add to our discussion here.
The show is over but the conversation continues. You can download the audio here.

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