After Slate wrote about an economics paper alleging a link between TV and autism, I blogged my skepticism regarding the claim. I haven’t seen or heard anything since that time to change my opinion.
Yesterday, the Wall Street Journal revisited that paper on autism, but also embedded the discussion into a larger question of whether economists and economic techniques should be aimed at answering questions outside of economics. It was a pretty interesting article, but unfortunately unless you are a Wall Street Journal subscriber you will have to take my word for it because the Wall Street Journal is one of the few newspapers that don’t give away most of their content free online.
As an aside, isn’t it strange that we live in a world where I’m puzzled as to why the WSJ won’t give away their product for free? In general, it doesn’t seem like a good idea to give your product away if you are a company, but given that most newspapers do, why doesn’t the WSJ? Is it that there is something different about their readership that makes free online a bad idea for the WSJ, but a good idea for others? I doubt it. My guess is that either it is a good idea to give free access or it isn’t. Either the WSJ is making a mistake or other newspapers that do give stuff away are making a mistake. I’d like to know the answer to this question, and I’m sure the newspapers would like to know too.
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The WSJ is doing the right thing, and it is likely that other “premium” newspapers with content of their quality will follow suit. WSJ is an expensive paper at $1/issue newsstand, and most of its readers have internet access and many are paid as business expenses, so it is a poor business model for them in particular to give away their content. NY Times already requires payment for its columnists since that is a large part of its “can’t get it elsewhere” content.
Here’s a great read on the issue
The WSJ is doing the right thing, and it is likely that other “premium” newspapers with content of their quality will follow suit. WSJ is an expensive paper at $1/issue newsstand, and most of its readers have internet access and many are paid as business expenses, so it is a poor business model for them in particular to give away their content. NY Times already requires payment for its columnists since that is a large part of its “can’t get it elsewhere” content.
Here’s a great read on the issue
The WSJ is the paper of record for the those of us in the trenches. Too bad I had to cancel my subscription years ago because of their politically biased editorial section. I wouldn’t mind a bias towards pro business thinking, but supporting one political party outright over the other – no matter what he issue – was just too much for an independant thinker like myself. I also factored exactly what you are referencing into the cancellation of my subscription to both the online and paper WSJ. It was no longer worth it when I could obtain much of the information for free on Yahoo. However, I do miss the personal journal. Not worth the price of admission alone, but I do miss it.
The WSJ is the paper of record for the those of us in the trenches. Too bad I had to cancel my subscription years ago because of their politically biased editorial section. I wouldn’t mind a bias towards pro business thinking, but supporting one political party outright over the other – no matter what he issue – was just too much for an independant thinker like myself. I also factored exactly what you are referencing into the cancellation of my subscription to both the online and paper WSJ. It was no longer worth it when I could obtain much of the information for free on Yahoo. However, I do miss the personal journal. Not worth the price of admission alone, but I do miss it.
They try to position the paper as an investment rather than as entertainment. The WSJ used to have an TV ad campaign where they would show the difference in wealth between those that read the WSJ and those that didn’t.
Also, many companies will allow employees to expense the $100/yr in subscribing to the WSJ whereas they probably would not pay for subscriptions to the New York Times or Washington Post.
They try to position the paper as an investment rather than as entertainment. The WSJ used to have an TV ad campaign where they would show the difference in wealth between those that read the WSJ and those that didn’t.
Also, many companies will allow employees to expense the $100/yr in subscribing to the WSJ whereas they probably would not pay for subscriptions to the New York Times or Washington Post.
Perhaps they feel that the market for online news is saturated, and that their entry now would (1) require a large investment to develop an online edition that could compete with other online papers, (2) take only a very small portion of the online market, and (3) compel many of their subscribers to cancel their subscriptions in favor of the free online version. These factors wouldn’t impact papers already online, since they already have an established online presence and their subscription base has already adjusted accordingly. The Washington Post would be unlikely to gain many new paper subscribers if they canceled their online service, so it doesn’t make sense for them to close that down now.
It’s also possible that the WSJ readership really is different – presumably more conservative, for example. Given the cultural stereotype that liberals tend to be more immersed in all-things-internet than conservatives, the WSJmay simply believe that not much of their target audience wants an online version.
Perhaps they feel that the market for online news is saturated, and that their entry now would (1) require a large investment to develop an online edition that could compete with other online papers, (2) take only a very small portion of the online market, and (3) compel many of their subscribers to cancel their subscriptions in favor of the free online version. These factors wouldn’t impact papers already online, since they already have an established online presence and their subscription base has already adjusted accordingly. The Washington Post would be unlikely to gain many new paper subscribers if they canceled their online service, so it doesn’t make sense for them to close that down now.
It’s also possible that the WSJ readership really is different – presumably more conservative, for example. Given the cultural stereotype that liberals tend to be more immersed in all-things-internet than conservatives, the WSJmay simply believe that not much of their target audience wants an online version.