Inevitable
Part of my daily routine involves checking the daily news. It is a habit I started ever since I woke up late on September 11, 2001, and I obliviously went about my day. (Someone had to give me a hint to check the news.) With the evolution of online news, I have come to appreciate more than story in the article; I delightfully anticipate the post scripted comments, left by arbitrary users. The rantings are often impulsive and fleeting, and they rarely offer any contribution to the news piece. Still, it fascinates me to see what others have to say about a common story. With the internet being a reliable source of news, I found it ironic how some people commented about the likely demise of the San Francisco Chronicle's print by essentially saying, "Good riddance."
With the recent declarations that newsprint is dead, I wonder what business model would be effective solution for news companies. While the medium is approaching its obsolescence, the content it provides is still valuable. Faced with fiscal insolvency, the reality that we will no longer have newspaper vendors and paperboy deliveries is at hand. There are some who say that the newspaper industry did itself in by giving away their content for free, via the internet. Unfortunately, it is not a matter of selling news to consumers. For as long as I have known news disemination, it has always worked on a commercial advertising model. Advertisements have sustained news providers, and the internet providers are giving the same thing a go.
Keeping that in mind, I think the internet business model needs to be able to take micro-payments, for transient users. The convenience of being able to hand a vendor a quarter and quickly receive my paper always struck me as a novel and pleasant system. The troubles facing online journalism are not so much an issue with their content, but with the limited enviornment that is the internet. With all the access to information and communcation that can be had, it would take a confounding effort to hand someone a quarter, via the World Wide Web.
With the recent declarations that newsprint is dead, I wonder what business model would be effective solution for news companies. While the medium is approaching its obsolescence, the content it provides is still valuable. Faced with fiscal insolvency, the reality that we will no longer have newspaper vendors and paperboy deliveries is at hand. There are some who say that the newspaper industry did itself in by giving away their content for free, via the internet. Unfortunately, it is not a matter of selling news to consumers. For as long as I have known news disemination, it has always worked on a commercial advertising model. Advertisements have sustained news providers, and the internet providers are giving the same thing a go.
Keeping that in mind, I think the internet business model needs to be able to take micro-payments, for transient users. The convenience of being able to hand a vendor a quarter and quickly receive my paper always struck me as a novel and pleasant system. The troubles facing online journalism are not so much an issue with their content, but with the limited enviornment that is the internet. With all the access to information and communcation that can be had, it would take a confounding effort to hand someone a quarter, via the World Wide Web.