Other than The Journal, where else can you read about the actions of the local school board or see your kid making the winning goal?
For that value, we have asked our loyal readers to purchase a print subscription or buy it the local newsstands.
On Monday, we will ask our loyal online readers to do their part and purchase a subscription for that same valued information.
It’s a matter of financial common sense for this publication and many others.
A plus for readers who believe it’s important to support this local business is that online subscribers will be able to read news stories and other valuable information when it is completed by our news staff. Up until now, we have withheld all but the most breaking news until the print edition was available to our subscribers.
When technology made it easier for newspapers to share their content online, most, including The Journal, offered that product for free. Online readers have had access to all our news for free since January 2000. Sure, the news wasn’t available until our print editions had rolled off the press, but it was free to anyone who had a computer.
During the past decade, more and more readers turned to this free content, instead of stopping at the local gas station for a copy or reaching into their mailbox for their subscribed edition.
While our website and print editions allowed us to share our news with more readers across the world, this transition has resulted in a decline of the traditional print edition. And along with that has come a negative financial impact. This is true for most all newspapers across the nation, forcing more and more to consider a fee for online readership.
News & Tech, an industry trade publication, reported in August that more than 20 percent of U.S. newspapers had established some sort of online pay model. Within the past year, large news organizations such as Gannett Co. and McClatchy Co. have either instituted online subscription programs or announced plans to do so.
The New York Times is possibly the newspaper industry’s biggest success story when it comes to digital subscriptions, claiming more than 500,000 digital subscribers.
On Monday, we will truly be a part of the digital age of news and information. We firmly believe that The Journal covers Borderland like no other news source. We devote significant financial and human resources to the gathering and reporting of the news. And now, in exchange for making the full extent of our award-winning news coverage available online, we are asking readers to support that endeavor financially.
Those who visit ifallsjournal.com this week will be entitled to view eight free articles every 30 days. And we hope that online readers will want more and sign up for full access for a small fee.
Local readers who already subscribe to The Journal’s print edition will have full access to what we call our “digital daily” for just $3 more per year. Those who don’t want the printed newspaper can subscribe to the digital daily for the same rate as the printed version, just $79 annually.
We think this gives readers the best of all worlds when it comes to local news coverage. No matter where, no matter when, you have access to The Journal’s wealth of news and information.
Experience at other newspapers tells us that some readers will think our decision to begin charging for online news is just plain wrong. Some may turn to other sources of free news.
But this decision isn’t taken lightly. It’s true that free news is readily available on the Internet. Yet, nowhere will readers find the depth and breadth of coverage of Borderland that they get through The Journal website and newspaper.
Not all content on The Journal website will require payment. Some content, such as obituaries, weddings and other information, will not count against readers’ eight-stories-per month limit. We think, in time, the eight free stories per month will be our best selling point to encourage readers to sign up for the unlimited digital daily subscription.
The Internet age has presented numerous challenges to those of us in the newspaper business. But it also has given us myriad opportunities to present the news to our readers in ever-expanding ways. One of those ways will be to use our website as a digital daily edition, with more frequent updates and additions to the news content.
As we ask our readers to pay for our coverage online, we also are challenging ourselves to earn that investment through new, additional coverage that’s delivered to you, our readers when you want it and where you want it.
