How the Guardian improbably put itself on the path to profits

Re:How the Guardian improbably put itself on the path to pro... by Jedd on Tuesday January 30, 2018 @03:52AM (#16263852)

> I don't want 15 different subscriptions. I'll pay a premium for 1.

Is the premium you'd pay equal to or greater than the sum of the 15 services you'd subscribe to? If not,then you've answered your subsequent question (why haven't they done this) -- between one and all of the 15 would take a hit.

Sure, it may be overall better for each to do this, and obtain your patronage, but it's a trivial assumption to make that they've collectively run the numbers and determined it's not that compelling a path.

What's the problem, by the way, of having 15 subscriptions? Is it the 15+ emails a year to renew, the hundreds of spam emails you're likely to get (you'd still get those with an aggregated subscription model, I suspect), or some other factor(s)?

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Re:How the Guardian improbably put itself on the path to pro... by lars_francke on Tuesday January 30, 2018 @05:59AM (#16264322)

The problem is that you pay for a lot of content you're not going to read. I'm going to assume that no one reads everything from 15 sources. And 15 subscriptions are expensive. NYT for example is relatively cheap (like 10$/month) but the large newspapers in Germany and Switzerland are more like 40€/month each.

I'd never pay that because there's at least 60% of content I don't read because it doesn't interest me or I have no time. To get a full picture I'd need multiple subscriptions which is prohibitively expensive. So instead I pay none (at least no daily) and just read what's free on the net.

A flat rate subscription model could also prevent a bit of the filter bubble because it would allow me to read at no further expense different views from paper that I'd never pay to subscribe to separately.

I disagree with your assumption as well. Maybe they have room their numbers but in my opinion their are missing out on a new business model. Feels very much like the early music business.

All these new digital portfolios (including okay ones like the guardian) are only the very first and limited step the industry should take. They are really very limited in functionally and vision.

I know there are others like me but I'm not sure how many. I'm hoping for a change. Good information and well paid journalists are getting more and more important I think.

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Re:How the Guardian improbably put itself on the path to pro... by us0r on Tuesday January 30, 2018 @07:57AM (#16264837)

> Is the premium you'd pay equal to or greater than the sum of the 15 services you'd subscribe to

Probably not but I would be happy to do $30-$50 depending on whats included. I prob only read a couple of articles on each which is another reason.

> If not,then you've answered your subsequent question (why haven't they done this)

So take $0?

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Re:How the Guardian improbably put itself on the path to pro... by jeamish on Tuesday January 30, 2018 @05:22AM (#16264199)

Incorrect assumption. www.inkl.com.

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Re:How the Guardian improbably put itself on the path to pro... by Jedd on Tuesday January 30, 2018 @05:37AM (#16264251)

> Incorrect assumption. www.inkl.com.

I'm not sure I follow.

Are you assuming that parent's desired 15 resources are included in inkl.com, or do you think that I'm claiming that they're not?

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Re:How the Guardian improbably put itself on the path to pro... by icc97 on Tuesday January 30, 2018 @08:03AM (#16264879)

I think jeamish makes a reasonable assumption. The 13 or so sources (it's annoying to find, see image near the bottom) that inkl.com has are often sources that are on the front page of HN. So a $15/mth subscription seems like an acceptable cost for the OP if $10/mth is OK for 1 newspaper.

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