There is a conventional wisdom in the media industry that micropayments for online content don’t work, but Greg Golebiewski of Znak It says that this isn’t true, and that media companies need to experiment with the model. Read more »
It’s a risky bet, but the new owners of the Orange County Register — two entrepreneurs with no background in traditional media — are pouring money and resources into the newspaper, and not just online but in print as well. Read more »
The Daily Mail, the world’s sixth largest news site, says it is not only growing digital revenue faster than most other papers, but has engagement levels that put it above Yahoo and even YouTube. Read more »
New owner Jay Penske is shutting down Variety magazine’s daily print edition and removing the paywall around the century-old tabloid’s online content. But will these radical moves help the paper survive against more nimble rivals? Read more »
Hundreds of traditional publishers have erected paywalls around their content, but there is much to be gained by focusing monetization on individuals rather than an entire newspaper. Here are a few suggestions on how publishers could do this. Read more »
With Netflix on a roll, its big European rival — Amazon-owned Lovefilm — seems more and more desperate to staunch the flow of subscribers quitting the service and moving elsewhere. Read more at GigaOM »
Paywalls are being erected at hundreds of newspapers around the world, but Guardian Media CEO Andrew Miller says his newspaper is still opposed to a subscription wall because it wants to expand its readership as much as possible. Read more »
A comment about a Bloomberg story on the New York Times paywall started a debate about the positive and negative effects of paywalls that included some media industry luminaries such as the former CEO of Dow Jones and the former publisher of the Wall Street Journal. Read more at GigaOM »
Orange has reportedly asked banks to find a US investor for Dailymotion, as the French video site embarks on a subscription video by embracing the growing paid kids’ content trend. Read more »
Critics of the Washington Post say that the only approach that will solve the newspaper’s financial problems is to put up a paywall around their content like everyone else — but while that might buy time, it’s not a long-term strategy for new-media success. Read more at GigaOM »
Should content owners sell through a subscription or on a piece-by-piece basis? That depends on the country they will be selling to, according to data that shows wildly varying patterns. Read more »
A start-up is trying to bring Next Issue Media-style magazine subscriptions to European iPads. But Le Kiosk is taking on €5.6 million in funding to improve its underlying tech with social features and more. Read more »
The Financial Times’ digital subscriber sign-up continues apace, as the paper finds more money and more readers in paid digital content whilst the advertising market looks weak. Read more »
Any subscription music service from Apple could fundamentally alter the entertainment business. But it may come only when iTunes’ current gas runs out, and we’re not quite there yet. Read more »
Carrier bundling will help grow music subscription income by 46 percent a year, one analyst forecasts. Spotify continues on that road by allying with Deutsche Telekom in Germany. Read more »
As more newspapers roll out metered paywalls and subscription plans, trying to duplicate the success of the New York Times, some journalists hope that being funded by readers will help stop the ad-driven pageview race and save quality journalism. But this argument is fundamentally flawed. Read more at GigaOM »
Only a sliver of people who have tried out The Guardian’s iPad edition for free end up subscribing after their trial. But does that small percentage matter? Other publishers also see low premium take-up, The Guardian is more interested in selling ads than subs. Read more »
