I got a lot of emails yesterday wondering about my reaction to the Star-Advertisers announcement of their new paywall for digital content.
Well, here’s one prediction: There are going to be some unhappy local folks when they figure out that they are being asked to pay as much as twelve times more than mainlanders for the same digital subscriptions.
Yup. The S-A is quoting $9.95 a month for digital-only subscriptions for Hawaii residents, but enter a mainland zip code and discover an unadvertised price break that drops the cost to $1.95 a month or $10 for the year.
No wonder the newspaper’s announcement yesterday sounded a little defensive. The long editorial column announcing the move didn’t have any of the relevant details, like prices and a clear explanation of what is included in the “premium content” that is becoming “subscription only”.
And I noticed that comments were turned off, so readers couldn’t sound off on the announcement.
That doesn’t signal a whole lot of confidence, or so it seems to me.
So, a day later, there’s more information.
Full access, including the print and digital editions: $19.95 a month (presumably $239.40 per year, unless there’s an annual price break). I don’t know if I would call this the “best value,” as the S-A advertising proclaims.
$9.95 a month for a digital-only subscription for Hawaii subscribers
$50 a year “special” price for new local digital-only suscribers
$1.95 per month or $10 a year for a digital subscription for mainland subscribers
Unfortunately, the “free with your subscription to the paper” idea doesn’t work, because I’m sure few subscribers are paying that premium $240 a year price, with all of the “specials” that have floated around.
Here’s the list of what readers will continue to get for free.
• Breaking News
• Website Front Page
• Weather
• AP Sports
• Section Fronts – Sports, Business, News, Editorial, Feature, Weather
• Event Calendars
• Honolulu Pulse – including tgif
• Photo Galleries
• Blogs
• Classifieds
• Travel
• Obituaries
• Traffic
• Breaking News app for your mobile device
Hmmmm. I think $50 per year isn’t unreasonable. But I’m not sure there’s enough “premium” content to sustain the higher rates. I suppose we’ll soon see.
Oh, one more thing. In order to subscribe, you will have to actively agree to their “terms of service.” I suppose that’s more honest than hiding them in a footnote that browsers are presumed to have read and agreed to.
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Sounds like extortion…you will buy the hard copy so we can pay for this giant expensive press and squeeze an extra 27% out of our advertisers.
Ian,
I called the customer service number and was told the “free with print subscription is for ALL subscriptions regardless of whatever deal you may or may not have”. I spoke with the manager who confirmed this. I think the mainland price makes a lot of sense from a business perspective. The need to have the product and its relevance is much less than those living there so it is priced accordingly it seems.
I have a budget for my online news expenditures. As much as I’d like to have full access to StarAd, Civil Beat, Pacific Business News, NYT, etc., I can’t afford everything.
Unable to do some deficit spending or print money like some entities we know, I must make choices.
Thing is, the absence of hard facts and clear explanations that characterizes the paywall announcement spotlights the very problems I have with the StarAd’s overall performance.
Sadly, it will not be among the survivors in my little online world.
help us out here. if all that stuff is still free, what are people paying for? the monthly business story about real property prices NOT changing?
I’m wondering if they are going to shift or change their deadlines for their stories so online readers will get the latest news, in story form not just alerts, 24/7? If not why pay for a digital copy of yesterday’s news?
As existing paper subscribers, we signed up for the digital access. I also have some questions on how this will work but it’s currently very difficult to find an FAQ or even a section for digital subscribers at the SA website.
Among the questions, will this work like the NYT’s plan, where you can access your subscription from any PC as long as you can log into the website? Or, is there a limit to the number of PCs or devices from which an account holder can log in?
wise: found this on FAQ section; does this answer your question? So you can’t have more than one pc/device accessing the SA at the same time.
Can other members of my household get online access with my “All Access” subscription?
Currently only one login is included with each “All Access” subscription.
I agree with Richard. Budgets for online subscriptions are limited. In today’s economy they’re even more of a luxury than a necessity.
I think the recent memory of having two papers that, individually, were better then combined version, will make getting more money out of the current content even harder. I’d personally like to see an improvement in the scope and depth of reporting before even considering it in the online news budget.
I’m curious to see how the paywall works for institutional users of the website. The online FAQ says online access will “remain tied to the number of print subscriptions” paid by business users. What does “tied” mean? Is that a ratio (X number of permitted online users per Y number of paid print subscriptions)? Will login be required? What about academia, government, etc.?
At first, strange . . . , discount from mainland address. Typed in a mainland zipcode – and yes, $1.95 per month, $10 per year. ARE you kidding? Why charge a different price for local customers. Price should be the same. Same content. There are other on-line newspapers who are willing to share the news with us for the purity of “free press”.
Hey that reminds me of Pay Per View for UH Sports. Neighbor island folks get to have the games cheaper. Why charge a different price for Oahu and neighbor island. Should be the same. Same game. Or better yet should be FREE. UH is my team! Go Warriors!
since having zero daily (physical) newspapers is not out of the realm of possibilities — I am not terribly upset
by coincidence, I just recently re-subscribed (after many years not getting it) to the weekend print subscription so that my kids would know what a physical newspaper is
I guess my timing was good — because I guess I will be getting full online access for the price of my weekend special
Ian, you’ve buried the lede… The real story here is the SA plans to develop premium content!
I’m still nostalgic for the days when cars had carburetors. But that doesn’t mean I’m boycotting modern cars. Still need to get I’m going.
I put it various zip codes and got the following prices.
Oahu 14 cents per day
Outer Islands 7 cents per day
Mainland 3 cents per day
Me thinks that seems pretty reasonable. What’s all the hoopla for? Why the constant cheering for their failure? Me thinks many of the posters on this site would cheer that Jesus Christ can”t move the rock from in front of the cave.
This revives the old question about the viability of newspaper firewalls in general, and whether or not what might work for the Wall Street Journal will work for local newspapers.
With that in mind, I perused today’s WSJ edition, and stumbled across the following blog entry, “Americans Taking Shorter, Cheaper Vacations” by Quentin Quattrell.
http://blogs.smartmoney.com/paydirt/2011/07/25/americans-taking-shorter-cheaper-vacations/
The news does not bode well for Hawaii’s tourism industry: “Recession-scarred families are still not ready to go out and splurge on vacation. In fact, many are still cutting back on their big summer holidays.” In fact, this are getting worse than they had been in 2010.
“Some 63% of households making at least $50,000 a year are scaling back on their vacation plans this year, up from 51% in 2010, according to a new survey from Texas-based First Command Financial Services. And for the last three years – since the recession began — one quarter of respondents have been renting a house or condo instead of staying at a hotel and even combining a family visit with their summer vacations, while 46% of travelers said this is their second year of driving instead of flying. “These results reinforce the new frugality that has taken hold of the middle class,” said Scott Spiker, CEO of Texas-based First Command Financial Services, which carried out the survey. Over 80% of families are still taking vacations this year, but Spiker says, “Saving more, spending less and reducing debt are the guiding principles for middle-income families this summer.””
This reminds me of something I read recently, that sales at Walmart are down because middle-class and working-class Americans are simply running out of money.
But the middle class and below are the target audience of local newspapers. The economy has improved for the affluent section of society, but the economy might be getting worse for the majority of Americans, and local newspapers might be taking more of a hit than they already have.
But this also applies to Civil Beat. Creating a public affairs journal in the middle of the Pacific Ocean and without advertising might turn out to have been an indulgence. Eventually, Civil Beat may have to bring in entertainment and advertising. But if Civil Beat did this, would it hurt the SA, and how much? Would it become a two-newspaper town again at that point? And will the SA eventually become a completely online newspaper — and if so, when?
I agree with Da Facts. It makes perfect sense for a product that has significantly less value to potential buyers (in this case due to distance) to be priced accordingly. The Outer Islands are priced at half the price Oahu is being asked to pay due to the lack of local relevance for them. They have their own local sites to provide the local content. Same for the mainland but even more so…..its about time the NI folks get a break in something. They pay 3 to 4 times more for their print subscription than what Oahu pays due to air freight and other distribution costs I suppose. Like Hawaii Warrior said earlier no one raised a fuss when Oceanic charges NI folks a fraction of what they charge Oahu residents for pay for view games. Again, it’s relevance. I have to smile when I see an organization such as Civil Beat take swipes at their “competitor” for having the audacity to charge for content. As Ian would say, hmmmm…….In my opinion the SA has a far greater chance of succeeding than CB in charging for content as they have scale and a 20 lane highway with lots of entrance and exit ramps. CB has a lonely two lane bumpy road that ends up at at either the Legislature or City Hall. Not a lot of other value that the “vast majority” are willing to pay for. I think that is the lesson they learned early on as they abandoned their early game plan to charge $19.95 a month and is now free or virtually free. Lastly, why can’t CB give us some numbers like how many “subscribers” they have and then maybe “users”? They have zero financial reasons to be quiet, the money will likely never be much so why not just tell us? What’s the risk? Mahalo.