Losing the will to pay through the wall

January 25, 2010

It’s a tricky business, the art of securing reader loyalty – and cash. Whether pay walls will work is the hot topic among media folk at present, with all eyes on the Murdoch empire and its reported implementation of pay walls in May. If there is a consensus, it appears to be one of doubt. As one long-serving, senior journalist was heard to opine recently: “Murdoch doesn’t get things wrong. But I don’t know. This time he might not be right.”

Another media type – an ad man, in fact – drops us a line to lament the fact that he can no longer access the FT through mediauk alerts.

“I wanted to read about how Yahoo was keeping up in the social media race, which struck me as a good story from the FT,” he writes, “but when I clicked on the mediauk alert, a page came up on the FT website telling me that I’d exceeded my quota of free stories and had to register if I wanted to read it.”

To this, we suggested that registering with FT was not too onerous a task. Moreover, at this juncture doing so was still free.

“I haven’t got the time,” said our correspondent. “I guess I can live without the story after all.”

We fear that if some people can’t even be bothered to register for free online newspaper content, the idea that they will pay for it has a long way to go before becoming reality.

 

2 Responses to “Losing the will to pay through the wall”

Posted by:
Tweets that mention Losing the will to pay through the wall | Professional Services PR Firm -- Topsy.com on January 26, 2010 at 4:32 am

[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by adamjones, Spada PR. Spada PR said: RT @applemacbookpro: I loved that! Losing the will to pay through the wall http://bit.ly/4sL4jV [...]

Posted by:
How does the FT do it? | Professional Services PR Firm on March 23, 2010 at 9:41 am

[...] that is, at the FT. For all its talk of pay walls (about which we harbour grave doubts, but that’s another story), week in, week out the FT produces the highest quality journalism [...]

Comments

Please submit comments to Swordplay below.

Supreme Court on Twitter

February 6, 2012

Something remarkable happened today. Yes, the Supreme Court launched its Twitter feed. It even has a Twitter policy, one of caveats, disclaimers and little by way of illumination but regardless: who would have thought that the successor body to the House of Lords would stoop to engage with the world of tweets, hashtags and retweets?

We look forward to the day when court business will be conducted via Twitter. Meantime, check out this link for an excellent blog on the Supreme Court.

Not so right said Fred

February 2, 2012
fred hat

So Farewell, then, Sir Fred Goodwin.

Now you are just Fred.

Not Right Said Fred, but plain Fred.

The Forfeiture Committee did for you.

No one had heard of it before,

But Dave said it had to act, and it did.

Trouble is that no one knows what to think.

Is it ‘Alas, poor Fred‘,

Or ‘Hurray! Sir Fred is dead!’?

We don’t know.

Do you?

By A. Mob, aged 1,378 and a half.

London Goes AWOL

January 31, 2012
CNN

STOP PRESS:

Fed up with being stuck on the Thames in south-east England, London yesterday decided to move. In a dramatic gesture which augurs ill for the Olympics, the city upped sticks and relocated to East Anglia.

Lawyers were not consulted about the move, and the city’s precise motivation remains unclear. However, financiers fear that London’s decision is a sign that it wishes to downsize. Moreover, a source from London said: “We no longer want to be Britain’s seat of power. If the Scots can deregulate, why can’t we? East Anglia is a nice place where nothing happens. It’s time for a quiet life. Please respect our right to privacy.”

Elsewhere, Birmingham did not do anything, but Manchester was seen to be packing its bags. “There’s an opportunity for us,” said Manchester. “We can become London.”

East Anglia said: “We don’t mind. It’ll be refreshing to be associated with something other than fens and flatness.”

A cartologist at CNN, which broke the extraordinary news, was later fired.