NY Times Apparently to Start Charging Online Readers

Sunday, January 17, 2010

After two years of being offered for free and two years of internal debate and chaos, The New York Times appears to be on the verge of charging online readers again. With over 15 million unique visitors last month (although down from 19 million in September of last year), “The Grey Lady” has over 3 million more visitors a month than the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post. Both, however, have paying subscribers to at least some of their content.

The Times had previously tried to use a product called TimesSelect which was an online version of their newspaper, which was free to print subscribers, but cost online-only readers $50 a year.  TimesSelect was ended in September of 2007 when the Times hoped that online ad revenue would increase their cash flow and allow it to hold onto the millions of readers migrating to free online blogs for their news.

The Times has been fighting a morbid storm for the last year. With the combination of the unstopping growth of new media news sources and with the drop in advertising because of the recession, the paper is facing huge income issues across the board.  The paper has been forced to repeatedly charge more for its print editions, mortgage its own building, cut staff (8% last year alone) and trim salaries for all employees (5% last year).

Apparently set to take action on the biggest question facing the struggling print media, the entire industry, let alone the NY Times, must be holding its breath.