> 300,000 subscribers (25,000 per annum)

Crazy, unverified statistic I heard- around 20% of those users only use that subscription for access to their AOL instant messenger clone. All trades are on it, so you've got to be on it too. Walled garden to the extreme.

People gladly pay that to be certain they are dealing with other people who have paid that, exclusively. That is, after all, the classic function of walled gardens (and private parties, clubs, etc.)

Bloomberg says its 325k and the revenue number is a pretty good estimate

https://www.bloomberg.com/company/bloomberg-facts/

I wonder how long for -

http://uk.businessinsider.com/goldman-sachs-symphony-custome...

I think it's kind of like the magazine Departures that American Express sends to its platinum card holders - it let's the company do some free advertising/marketing - but it allows the company to sell print advertising to a very desirable client base

All the great news services were luxury products built on top of distribution monopolies. Bloomberg is just one of the few that still has that monopoly intact.

Is it really strange? Isn't somewhere on the loss-leader/freemium spectrum, just on a grander scale than what we're used to from con/prosumer webapps?

The model is far more established than you might think. The first general-circulation newspapers in the US were largely party political organs, some of which retain elements of that in their names: the Arizona Republic was originally the Arizona Republican. Papers with Union in their titles occasionally reflect a labour bent.

That faded with the advent of mass-market advertising, which grew tremendously from about 1860 onward, and becoming a mounting concern in the 1890s and 1900s.

I've mentioned Hamilton Holt's short book (notes of a lecture, really), Commercialism and Journalism (1909) a few times. The first section is a very good breakdown of the role of advertising in media.

https://archive.org/details/commercialismjou00holtuoft

Rather similar to The Economist newspaper.

Its revenues are divided roughly by thirds: advertising, subscribers, and the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), a bespoke research consultancy.

terminal sub is not the only thing you can buy at bloomberg.

asset pricing, data, order management, trading platform, STP, risk management are all things you can pay for on top of the terminal itself. some of these services are quite expensive compared to other providers on the street

Not that strange. Think of the magazine as being paid for by the marketing budget.