And all the greatest content shall be free!
No doubt Murdoch will open up WSJ.com to all as well. Both the Times and Journal were the only daily newspapers to successfully implement a paid subscription model, the Times reportedly generating over $20 million in revenue over the course of the two year TimesSelect experiment.
But the advertising landscape has changed, especially as ad sales models shift away from the pageviews to total time spent. This on the same day that AOL, which stands to benefit greatly from Nielsen’s total time spent measurements, announced a realignment of its ad strategy and a physical move from Dulles to Madison Avenue.
PaidContent breaks down the TimesSelect numbers here.
While I’m glad that I’ll no longer have to read another Frank Rich column out of context, cut-and-pasted on some random blog, I’m even happier that the excellent multimedia content on TS, as well as Kristof’s spin-off blogs (like this one written by my friend Will) will be free for the world to read.
So, are my beloved TimesSelect podcasts going to return… or what?
MORE: NYT;s letter to readers — the Pay Wall comes down at midnight EDT on the 19th. Also, Gillmor, Jarvis, and Ingram react.
