When is a wall more of a fence?

2June 10, 2013 by ItsAllJournalism

On Wednesday, June 12, the Washington Post will launch a paywall, limiting access to its online content to paid subscribers.

In this special podcast, It’s All Journalism producers Megan Cloherty, Anna Miars and Michael O’Connell discuss what this move means, including how the Washington Post’s paywall may be more of a fence than a wall — at least to start with.

Investigative journalist John Sullivan talks to It's All Journalism Producers Michael O'Connell and Julia O'Donoghue about his new job working for American University, The Washington Post and The Investigative Reporting Workshop.

#41 – John Sullivan — Portrait of an investigative reporter

Washington Post Web Producer Margaret Ely, right, listens to It's All Journalism producers Megan Cloherty, left; Michael O'Connell and Anna Miars, during a recent podcast recording. (Photo by Anna Miars/It's All Journalism).

#42 – Margaret Ely — Young journalist pursues success at The Washington Post

2 Comments (click here to leave a comment)

Greg Golebiewski (@znakit)

June 11, 2013 at 7:13 am

One big problem with the strategy to “monetize the international audience” as Michael tries to describe it (which might not be the WoPo’s actual goal) is that the international audience does not subscribe to “foreign to them” news source at the same rate the local readers would — international visitors are mostly casual, sporadic, checking news from sources like the WoPO only when something big and relevant to them happens.

Setting up a subscription-based wall or fence for international users (the casual ones) and keeping the paper free to the local (incl. government) seems as a mistake

Reply
- ItsAllJournalism
  
  June 11, 2013 at 8:15 am
  
  Greg,
  
  Good point. WaPo’s going to have to get online to pay some way. I’m not convinced a paywall is the best way. We’ll have to wait and see how this plays out. I don’t think the New York Times’ proported success with its paywall can be translated easily to other papers or other models — NYT still gets lots of money from its print edition and, well, the Times is the Times.
  
  Thanks for your input!
  
  Mike O’Connell
  
  Reply