OLD Media Moves

No decision yet on Dealbook paywall

December 3, 2010

Joe Pompeo of Yahoo News reports that there has been no decision made as to whether the popular DealBook section of the New York Times business news coverage will go behind the paper’s paywall when that is launched in 2011.

Pompeo writes, “At today’s Ignition conference, Business Insider’s Henry Blodget asked DealBook editor Andrew Ross Sorkin, ‘Is DealBook going to be inside the meter?’

“‘I think that when all that’s announced, we’ll have some more clarity,’ said Sorkin. ‘Some of those plans have still not been ironed out.’

“Blodget then asked Sorkin if he thought the paywall experiment, which will allow Times readers to access a certain number of articles before being asked to pony up, will be a ‘disaster.’

“‘I don’t think so at all,’ said Sorkin. ‘What you’re seeing [News Corp Chairman] Rupert [Murdoch] do [with The Times of London], with what I call a ‘hard wall,’ I think is hard. We’re not going in that direction. We recognize, like so many people, that when you go to the newsstand, you like to flip through the magazine or newspaper first, before you buy it. And that’s in large part how we’re approaching it.'”

Read more here.

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