«Մասնակից:Արշո/Ավազարկղ»–ի խմբագրումների տարբերություն

A paywall is a method of restricting access to content, with a purchase or a paid subscription, especially news.^[1][2] Beginning in the mid-2010s, newspapers started implementing paywalls on their websites as a way to increase revenue after years of decline in paid print readership and advertising revenue, partly due to the use of ad blockers.^[3] In academics, research papers are often subject to a paywall and are available via academic libraries that subscribe.^[4][5][6]

Paywalls have also been used as a way of increasing the number of print subscribers; for example, some newspapers offer access to online content plus delivery of a Sunday print edition at a lower price than online access alone.^[7] Newspaper websites such as that of The Boston Globe and The New York Times use this tactic because it increases both their online revenue and their print circulation (which in turn provides more ad revenue).^[7]

In 1996, The Wall Street Journal set up and has continued to maintain a "hard" paywall.^[8] It continued to be widely read, acquiring over one million users by mid-2007,^[9] and 15 million visitors in March 2008.^[10]

In 2010, following in the footsteps of The Wall Street Journal, The Times (London) implemented a "hard" paywall; a decision which was controversial because, unlike The Wall Street Journal, The Times is a general news site, and it was said that rather than paying, users would seek the information without charge elsewhere.^[11] The paywall was deemed in practice to be neither a success nor a failure, having recruited 105,000 paying visitors.^[12] In contrast The Guardian resisted the use of a paywall, citing "a belief in an open Internet" and "care in the community" as its reasoning – an explanation found in its welcome article to online news readers who, blocked from The Times site following the implementation of their paywall, came to The Guardian for online news.^[13] The Guardian since experimented with other revenue-increasing ventures such as open API. Other papers, prominently The New York Times, have oscillated between the implementation and removal of various paywalls.^[14] Because online news remains a relatively new medium, it has been suggested that experimentation is key to maintaining revenue while keeping online news consumers satisfied.^[15]

Some implementations of paywalls proved unsuccessful, and have been removed.^[16] Experts who are skeptical of the paywall model include Arianna Huffington, who declared "the paywall is history" in a 2009 article in The Guardian.^[17] In 2010, Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales reportedly called The Times's paywall "a foolish experiment."^[18] One major concern was that, with content so widely available, potential subscribers would turn to free sources for their news.^[19] The adverse effects of earlier implementations included decline in traffic^[20] and poor search engine optimization.^[16]

Paywalls have become controversial, with partisans arguing over the effectiveness of paywalls in generating revenue and their effect on media in general. Critics of paywalls include many businesspeople, academics such as media professor Jay Rosen, and journalists such as Howard Owens and media analyst Matthew Ingram of GigaOm. Those who see potential in paywalls include investor Warren Buffett, former Wall Street Journal publisher Gordon Crovitz, and media mogul Rupert Murdoch. Some have changed their opinions of paywalls. Felix Salmon of Reuters was initially an outspoken skeptic of paywalls, but later expressed the opinion that they could be effective.^[21] A NYU media theorist, Clay Shirky, was initially a skeptic of paywalls, but in May 2012 wrote, "[Newspapers] should turn to their most loyal readers for income, via a digital subscription service of the sort the [New York Times] has implemented."^[22][23]

Three high level models of paywall have emerged: hard paywalls that allow no free content and prompt the user straight away to pay in order to read, listen or watch the content, soft paywalls that allow some free content, such as an abstract or summary, and metered paywalls that allow a set number of free articles that a reader can access over a specific period of time, allowing more flexibility in what users can view without subscribing.^[24]

The "hard" paywall, as used by The Times, requires paid subscription before any of their online content can be accessed. A paywall of this design is considered the riskiest option for the content provider.^[25] It is estimated that a website will lose 90% of its online audience and ad revenue only to gain it back through its ability to produce online content appealing enough to attract subscribers.^[25] News sites with "hard" paywalls can succeed if they:

• Provide added value to their content
• Target a niche audience
• Already dominate their own market^[25]

Many experts denounce the "hard" paywall because of its inflexibility, believing it acts as a major deterrent for users. Financial blogger Felix Salmon wrote that when one encounters a "paywall and can't get past it, you simply go away and feel disappointed in your experience."^[26] Jimmy Wales, founder of the online encyclopedia Wikipedia, argued that the use of a "hard" paywall diminishes a site's influence. Wales stated that, by implementing a "hard" paywall, The Times "made itself irrelevant."^[18] Though the Times had potentially increased its revenue, it decreased its traffic by 60%.^[11]

The "soft" paywall is best embodied by the metered model. The metered paywall allows users to view a specific number of articles before requiring paid subscription.^[25] In contrast to sites allowing access to select content outside the paywall, the metered paywall allows access to any article as long as the user has not surpassed the set limit. The Financial Times allows users to access 10 articles before becoming paid subscribers.^[25] The New York Times controversially^[3] implemented a metered paywall in March 2011 which let users view 20 free articles a month before paid subscription and in April 2012 they reduced the number of free articles per month to 10.^[27] Their metered paywall has been defined as not only soft, but "porous",^[26] because it also allows access to any link posted on a social media site, and up to 25 free articles a day if accessed through a search engine.^[28]

The model is designed to allow the paper to "retain traffic from light users", which in turn allows the paper to keep their number of visitors high, while receiving circulation revenue from the site's heavy users.^[29] Using this model The New York Times garnered 224,000 subscribers in the first three months.^[3] While many proclaimed their paywall a success after it reported a profit in the third quarter of 2011, the profit increase is said to be "ephemeral" and "largely based on a combination of cutbacks and the sale of assets."^[30]

Google Search previously enforced a policy known as "First Click Free", whereby paywalled news websites were required to have a metered paywall for a minimum number of articles per-day (three, initially five) that could be accessed via results on Google Search or Google News. The site could still paywall other articles that were accessible via the page. This encouraged publications to allow their articles to be indexed by Google's web crawler, thus enhancing their prominence on Google Search and Google News. Sites that opted out of First Click Free were demoted in Google's rankings. Google discontinued the policy in 2017, stating that it provides additional tools for helping publications integrate subscriptions into its platforms.^[31][32]

A "softer" paywall strategy includes allowing free access to select content, while keeping premium content behind a paywall. Such a strategy has been said to lead to "the creation of two categories: cheap fodder available for free (often created by junior staffers), and more 'noble' content."^[25] This type of separation brings into question the egalitarianism of the online news medium. According to political and media theorist Robert A Hackett, "the commercial press of the 1800s, the modern world's first mass medium, was born with a profound democratic promise: to present information without fear or favour, to make it accessible to everyone, and to foster public rationality based on equal access to relevant facts.".^[33]

The Boston Globe implemented a version of this strategy in September 2011 by launching a second website, BostonGlobe.com, to solely offer content from the paper behind a hard paywall, aside from most sports content, which was kept open to compete against other local sports websites. The former Boston Globe website, Boston.com, was relaunched with a larger focus on community news, sports, and lifestyle content, as well as selected Boston Globe content. The paper's editor Martin Baron described the two services as "two different sites for two different kinds of reader – some understand [that] journalism needs to be funded and paid for. Other people just won't pay. We have a site for them."^[34] By March 2014 the site had over 60,000 digital subscribers; at that time, the Globe announced that it would replace the hard paywall with a metered system allowing users to read 10 articles without charge in any 30-day period. The Boston Globe editor Brian McGrory believed that an ability to sample the site's premium content would encourage more people to subscribe to the service. At the same time, McGrory also announced plans to give Boston.com a more distinct editorial focus, with a "sharper voice that better captures the sensibilities of Boston", while migrating other content by Globe writers, such as blogs from Boston.com to the paper's website, but keeping them freely available.^[35]

A Cookie banner that requires to either pay or accept ads and Third-party cookies in order to read the content. The compatibility of this technique with data protection laws like General Data Protection Regulation is controversial and multiple data protection agencies established different guidelines.^[36][37] In countries like Italy, Austria, France, Denmark it is lawful as long as the website provides the data subject with the option of accessing equivalent content or services without giving his or her consent to the storage and use of cookies or other tracking tools and the subscription to the site has a modest and fair cost so that it does not constrain the user’s free choice.^{[38][39][40][41]}

Professional reception to the implementation of paywalls has been mixed. Most discussion of paywalls centers on their success or failure as business ventures, and overlooks their ethical implications for maintaining an informed public. In the paywall debate there are those who see the implementation of a paywall as a "sandbag strategy" – a strategy which may help increase revenue in the short term, but not a strategy that will foster future growth for the newspaper industry.^[14] For the "hard" paywall specifically, however, there seems to be an industry consensus that the negative effects (loss of readership) outweigh the potential revenue, unless the newspaper targets a niche audience.^[25][42]

There are also those who remain optimistic about the use of paywalls to help revitalize floundering newspaper revenues. Those who believe implementing paywalls will succeed, however, continually buffer their opinion with contingencies. Bill Mitchell states that for a paywall to bring new revenue and not deter current readers, newspapers must: "invest in flexible systems, exploit their journalists' expertise in niche areas, and, crucially, offer readers their money's worth in terms of new value."^[15] The State of the News Media's 2011 annual report on American journalism makes the sweeping claim that: "[t]o survive financially, the consensus on the business side of news operations is that news sites not only need to make their advertising smarter, but they also need to find some way to charge for content and to invent new revenue streams other than display advertising and subscriptions."^[43] Even those who do not believe in the general success of paywalls recognize that, for a profitable future, newspapers must start generating more attractive content with added value, or investigate new sources of earning revenue.^[14]

Proponents of the paywall believe that it may be crucial for smaller publications to stay afloat. They argue that since 90 percent of advertising revenues are concentrated in the top 50 publishers, smaller operations can not necessarily depend on the traditional ad-supported free content model the way that larger sites can.^[44] Many paywall advocates also contend that people are more than willing to pay a small price for quality content. In a March 2013 guest post for VentureBeat, Malcolm CasSelle of MediaPass stated his belief that monetization would become "something of a self-fulfilling prophecy: people [will] pay for content, and that money goes back into making the overall content even better."^[45]

In April 2013 the Newspaper Association of America released its industry revenue profile for 2012, which reported that circulation revenue grew by 5 percent for dailies, making it the first year of circulation growth in ten years. Digital-only circulation revenue reportedly grew 275%; print and digital bundled circulation revenue grew 499%. Along with the shift towards bundling print and online into combined access subscriptions, print-only circulation revenue declined 14%. This news corroborates a growing belief that digital subscriptions will be the key to securing the long-term survival of newspapers.^[46][47]

In May 2019, research by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at the University of Oxford showed that despite the controversies surrounding paywalls, these were on the rise across Europe and the United States. According to the study by Felix Simon and Lucas Graves, more than two-thirds of leading newspapers (69%) across the EU and US were operating some kind of online paywall as of 2019, a trend that has increased since 2017 according to the researchers, with the US seeing an increase from 60% to 76%.^[48][49]

General user response to the implementation of paywalls has been measured through a number of recent studies which analyze readers' online news-reading habits. A study completed by the Canadian Media Research Consortium entitled "Canadian Consumers Unwilling to Pay for News Online", directly identifies the Canadian response to paywalls. Surveying 1,700 Canadians, the study found that 92% of participants who read the news online would rather find a free alternative than pay for their preferred site (in comparison to 82% of Americans^[50]), while 81% stated that they would absolutely not pay for their preferred online news site.^[51] Based on the poor reception of paid content by the participants, the study concludes with a statement similar to those of the media experts, stating, with the exception of prominent papers such as The Wall Street Journal and The Times, that given the "current public attitudes, most publishers had better start looking elsewhere for revenue solutions."^[42]

A study by Elizabeth Benítez from the World Association of News Publishers surveyed 355 participants in Mexico, Europe and the United States. The study found that "Young readers are willing to pay up to €6 for a monthly digital news subscription – 50% less than the average price (€14.09) across countries. According to the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism (Simon and Graves 2019), €14.09 is the average monthly subscription price across six European countries and the United States."^[52]

1. ↑ Tom Felle (2016-03-04). «Are paywalls saving journalism?». City, University of London. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 4 April 2020-ին. Վերցված է 2017-05-03-ին.
2. ↑ Joseph Lichterman (2016-07-20). «Here are 6 reasons why newspapers have dropped their paywalls». NiemanLab. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 21 March 2019-ին. Վերցված է 2017-05-03-ին.
3. ↑ ^{3,0 3,1 3,2} Preston, Peter (7 August 2011). «A Paywall that pays? Only in America». The Guardian. London. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 9 March 2021-ին. Վերցված է 22 October 2011-ին.
4. ↑ McWilliams, James (12 March 2019). «Why Should Taxpayer-Funded Research Be Put Behind a Paywall?». Pacific Standard (անգլերեն). Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 12 May 2021-ին. Վերցված է 2021-05-27-ին.
5. ↑ Sample, Ian. "Harvard University says it can’t afford journal publishers’ prices. Արխիվացված 1 Հոկտեմբեր 2017 Wayback Machine" The Guardian 24 (2012): 2012.
6. ↑ «Skirting Around Paywalls: How Scientists Quickly Get the Articles They Need». 3 March 2014. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 25 May 2021-ին. Վերցված է 5 July 2017-ին.
7. ↑ ^{7,0 7,1} Rosen, Rebecca (12 September 2011). «Can a Paywall Stop Newspaper Subscribers From Canceling?». The Atlantic. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 8 March 2021-ին. Վերցված է 12 October 2011-ին.
8. ↑ Salwen, Michael B.; Garrison, Bruce; Driscoll, Paul D. (2004). Online News and the Public. Routledge. էջ 136. ISBN 9781410611611. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 3 March 2021-ին. Վերցված է 17 December 2018-ին.
9. ↑ «The media's». The Week. 30 July 2010.
10. ↑ «Whoah! WSJ.com Quietly Makes Big Traffic Strides». Condé Nast. 11 April 2008. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 6 September 2012-ին. Վերցված է 14 April 2008-ին. «No wonder Rupert Murdoch's in no hurry to do away with The Wall Street Journal's online paywall. Even with it still in place around large sections of the site, traffic is still growing at a most impressive rate.»
11. ↑ ^{11,0 11,1} Wauters, Robin (17 November 2011). «Operation Failure: Times Plans To Charge For One-Day Access To Online News». Tech Crunch. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 12 May 2021-ին. Վերցված է 19 November 2011-ին.
12. ↑ Schonfeld, Erick (2 November 2011). «The Times UK Lost 4 Million Readers To Its Paywall Experiment». Tech Crunch. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 2 March 2021-ին. Վերցված է 19 November 2011-ին.
13. ↑ Crace, John (2 July 2011). «A warm welcome to guardian.co.uk for all former readers of the Times». The Guardian. London. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 8 March 2021-ին. Վերցված է 15 November 2011-ին.
14. ↑ ^{14,0 14,1 14,2} Greenslade, Anne (3 November 2011). «Stop taking the 'paywall pill' by pioneering new forms of online revenue». The Guardian. London. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 9 March 2021-ին. Վերցված է 15 November 2011-ին.
15. ↑ ^{15,0 15,1} Քաղվածելու սխալ՝ Սխալ <ref> պիտակ՝ «Vinter» անվանումով ref-երը տեքստ չեն պարունակում:
16. ↑ ^{16,0 16,1} Քաղվածելու սխալ՝ Սխալ <ref> պիտակ՝ «Five Failed» անվանումով ref-երը տեքստ չեն պարունակում:
17. ↑ Huffington, Arianna (11 May 2009), "The Paywall Is History" Արխիվացված 24 Մայիս 2021 Wayback Machine, The Guardian (London). Retrieved 25 October 2011.
18. ↑ ^{18,0 18,1} MacMillan, Gordon (10 August 2010). «Times paywall is a "foolish experiment" that won't last, says Wikipedia founder». The Wall. Արխիվացված է օրիգինալից 1 September 2011-ին. Վերցված է 13 October 2011-ին.
19. ↑ Chimbel, Aaron (17 March 2011). «The paywall debate: the challenge of charging». The Online Journalism Review. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 9 February 2013-ին. Վերցված է 27 October 2011-ին.
20. ↑ Milstead, David (8 October 2010). «Newspapers' Perilous Paywall Moment». Editor & Publisher. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 29 June 2013-ին. Վերցված է 22 August 2011-ին.
21. ↑ Salmon, Felix. «The NYT Paywall is Working». Reuters. Արխիվացված է օրիգինալից 17 September 2011-ին. Վերցված է 2 June 2012-ին.
22. ↑ Shirky, Clay. «WaPo must transform to survive». Columbia Journalism Review. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 19 October 2016-ին. Վերցված է 2 June 2012-ին.
23. ↑ Chittum, Ryan. «Responding to Clay Shirky on the Washington Post». Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 23 December 2016-ին. Վերցված է 2 June 2012-ին.
24. ↑ Pickard, Victor; T. Williams, Alex (2014-04-03). «Salvation or Folly? The Promises and Perils of Digital Paywalls». Digital Journalism. 2 (2): 195–213. doi:10.1080/21670811.2013.865967. S2CID 143335698. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 9 July 2020-ին. Վերցված է 2017-05-03-ին.
25. ↑ ^{25,0 25,1 25,2 25,3 25,4 25,5 25,6} Filloux, Frederick (15 June 2011). «Analyzing the metered model». Monday Note. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 18 October 2011-ին. Վերցված է 13 October 2011-ին.
26. ↑ ^{26,0 26,1} Salmon, Felix (14 August 2011). «How The New York Times Paywall Is Working». Wired. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 31 May 2012-ին. Վերցված է 15 October 2011-ին.
27. ↑ MEMMOTT, MARK. «NYTimes.com Cuts Free Articles To 10 Per Month, From 20». NPR.org. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 15 April 2015-ին. Վերցված է 28 March 2012-ին.
28. ↑ Indvik, Lauren (28 March 2011). «How To Hack the New York Times Paywall … With Your Delete Key». Wired. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 3 March 2021-ին. Վերցված է 13 October 2011-ին.
29. ↑ Edmonds, Rick. «Newspapers: Missed the 2010 Media Rally». The State of News Media 2011. Pew Research Center. Արխիվացված է օրիգինալից 28 November 2011-ին. Վերցված է 15 November 2011-ին.
30. ↑ Nelson, Anne (22 November 2011). «Truth and Contradictions: The Global New Industry Looks to the Future». Media Shift. Արխիվացված է օրիգինալից 30 May 2012-ին. Վերցված է 23 November 2011-ին.
31. ↑ Ong, Thuy (2017-10-02). «Google scraps controversial policy that gave free access to paywalled articles through search». The Verge (անգլերեն). Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 11 November 2020-ին. Վերցված է 2021-03-20-ին.
32. ↑ «Google and paid content». Google News Blog (անգլերեն). Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 13 March 2021-ին. Վերցված է 2021-03-20-ին.
33. ↑ Robert A. Hackett (2001). Ed Broadbent (ed.). Democratic Equality: What went wrong?. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. էջեր 197–211.
34. ↑ Kramer, Staci. «BostonGlobe.Com Launches Today; Shifts To Paying Subscribers Only 1 Oct». PaidContent. Gigaom. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 9 March 2021-ին. Վերցված է 3 December 2014-ին.
35. ↑ «Boston Globe drops paywall, adds meter instead». Poynter. Արխիվացված է օրիգինալից 28 November 2014-ին. Վերցված է 3 December 2014-ին.
36. ↑ «Is the use of a cookie wall allowed in European Countries?». iubenda (անգլերեն). Վերցված է 2024-01-09-ին.
37. ↑ Bouvier, Caroline (2022-06-16). «Cookie Wall & Paywall - Do's and Don'ts». Lexology (անգլերեն). Վերցված է 2024-01-09-ին.
38. ↑ «Linee guida cookie e altri strumenti di tracciamento». www.garanteprivacy.it (իտալերեն). 2021-06-10. Վերցված է 2024-01-09-ին.
39. ↑ «Cookie wall: all'esame del Garante privacy le iniziative degli editori». www.garanteprivacy.it (իտալերեն). 2022-10-18. Վերցված է 2024-01-09-ին.
40. ↑ «Cookie walls : la CNIL publie des premiers critères d'évaluation». www.cnil.fr (ֆրանսերեն). Վերցված է 2024-01-09-ին.
41. ↑ «Cookie walls». www.datatilsynet.dk (դանիերեն). Վերցված է 2024-01-09-ին.
42. ↑ ^{42,0 42,1} Logan, Donna; Fletcher, Fred; Hermida, Alfred; Korell, Darryl (29 March 2011). «Canadian Consumers Unwilling to Pay for News Online» (PDF). Canadian Media Research Consortium. Արխիվացված է օրիգինալից (PDF) 2011-04-10-ին. Վերցված է 15 November 2011-ին.
43. ↑ Olmstead, Kenny. «Online: Key Questions Facing Digital News». The State of News Media 2011. Pew Research Center. Արխիվացված է օրիգինալից 7 November 2011-ին. Վերցված է 15 November 2011-ին.
44. ↑ Kaplan, David (13 October 2007). «As Online Ad Revenue Remains Concentrated in Few Hands, Frustration Builds». Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 10 March 2021-ին. Վերցված է 23 October 2015-ին.
45. ↑ CasSelle, Malcolm (7 March 2013). «How charging for premium content will save publishers from certain death». Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 8 March 2021-ին. Վերցված է 8 September 2017-ին.
46. ↑ «The American Newspaper Media Industry Revenue Profile 2012». Newspaper Association of America. Արխիվացված է օրիգինալից 10 April 2013-ին. Վերցված է 9 April 2013-ին.
47. ↑ Sneed, Tierney (9 April 2013). «Pay Walls Could Be Print's Salvation Online». U.S. News & World Report. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 6 August 2020-ին. Վերցված է 9 April 2013-ին.
48. ↑ «Newspaper paywalls slowly increasing, but online news is still mostly free | Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism». reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 5 March 2021-ին. Վերցված է 2019-05-10-ին.
49. ↑ «Across seven countries, the average price for paywalled news is about $15.75/month». Nieman Lab. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 28 February 2021-ին. Վերցված է 2019-05-10-ին.
50. ↑ Reagan, Gillian (15 March 2010). «PEW: 82% Of Users Will Abandon Their Favorite News Site If They Put Up A Paywall». Business Insider. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 4 December 2020-ին. Վերցված է 15 November 2011-ին.
51. ↑ «Most Canadians unwilling to pay for news online, study suggests». The State of News Media 2011. Public Affairs. 12 April 2011. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 29 August 2014-ին. Վերցված է 15 November 2011-ին.
52. ↑ Benitez, Elizabeth (25 February 2021). «Survey shock: Young readers trust quality news and a good proportion are prepared to pay €6 for a monthly digital subscription». WAN-IFRA. Արխիվացված օրիգինալից 25 March 2021-ին. Վերցված է 18 March 2021-ին.