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On Wed, 12 Apr 1995, Dan Gillmor wrote:

> > >: Personally, Joe, I doubt the Web can stay as open as it is much longer.
> > >: Once dollar signs start appearing in people's heads, the party's over.
> > >: Or, at least, it becomes an invitation-only affair.
> > >In that case, we're doomed.
> > >And people wonder why I get so caustic about advertising on the net ...
> > Tell that to USA Today, the Post, the Star-Tribune, the Wall Street Journal
> > and (if rumors are true) soon the San Jose Mercury.
> 
> The rumors are true, to a degree. A lot of what we do on the Web will
> remain "free" to the public, but we are moving to a subscription model for
> the full Mercury Web content. That is, if you want full text of today's
> paper and other news you'll have to subscribe (paid subscribers will get a
> lot more than is offered now, by the way). The "free" Web pages will
> contain things like selected archives, summaries of today's news and all
> classified advertising. 

Most of these models will be switching to a "SuperPaper", for a flat fee 
of $30-40/month you will get access to more content than you could ever 
read, along with the search/filter mechanisms to help you get what you do 
want to read.  (I have 355 messages in my backlog).

> There's still a lot of question whether advertising can support this kind
> of service on the Web. That's one reason we're experimenting. 
There is a bit of question as to how to distribute/collect "credits" so 
that quality content is rewarded.  If someone puts up a WAIS engine that 
justs serves up artiles from this group, but the result is $2,000,000 in 
"on-line-orders", will they send Steve Outings a check?  Will Steve send 
Rex Ballard a Check?

> Dan Gillmor, Computing Editor              Internet: dgillmor@sjmercury.com
	Will Dan Gillmore send Rex Ballard a check?

	:-), :-)

	Rex Ballard


From rballard@cnj.digex.net Tue Apr 18 19:45:18 1995
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