Cincy.com no longer to be free

[dougdirt]

Also, how would this work for twitter. Their sports guys are very active on twitter. Would they no longer tweet news, but just have headlines and links to paid articles tweeted for them?

[Caveat Emperor]

Also, how would this work for twitter. Their sports guys are very active on twitter. Would they no longer tweet news, but just have headlines and links to paid articles tweeted for them?

I'd expect they'll stay very active. They'll be the best advertisement for the paper once the paywall goes up.

[dougdirt]

I'd expect they'll stay very active. They'll be the best advertisement for the paper once the paywall goes up.

I would hope so, but twitter, honestly, has a terrible return rate. When I post links to articles I write, if I get even 3% of my followers to click that link, it is "a good return" compared to what I normally get.

Maybe I am just a statistical oddity in that situation.

[George Anderson]

It's the Gannet Corp that is making this happen. They also own the Indystar which is also going to be a pay site also.

I won't pay 1 cent to read the rag so goodbye local newspaper.

[AtomicDumpling]

The Enquirer website is literally the worst website on the Internet. There are more popups, full page ads, pop-unders, scroll-up ads and garbage on that site than anywhere else on the web.

[Joseph]

Terrible decision by a horribly run company. The editor of that paper is just awful.

[hebroncougar]

The Enquirer website is literally the worst website on the Internet. There are more popups, full page ads, pop-unders, scroll-up ads and garbage on that site than anywhere else on the web.

Quoted for truth. I like reading about Ky High School sports, I really miss the days of the Post.

[nmculbreth]

Yeah, if they were going to charge, they should have done so straight-away and salvaged some of the content they were providing.

Now they've cut costs to nothing and done away with a lot of the coverage that would entice people to subscribe in the first place.

Bingo!

I'm not averse to paying for content - I've done so with the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times - but the amount and quality of the content needs to justify the expense. But after the slash and burn strategy they're left with a product that isn't worth the expense in either the digital or print format... you've got to wonder how much longer the Enquirer can remain in existence.

[Reds4Life]

I read the site usually once a day, but I won't be paying for it. Once this happens I will just go to one of the local news channels sites.

[savafan]

The Enquirer editor explains:

http://communitypress.cincinnati.com...sey=nav%7Chead

[IslandRed]

Setting the economic models aside for a moment, the editorial is correct about one thing. You can find a lot of things on the Internet, but if you're looking for local news and information and you prefer getting it from someone without a dog in the fight, you're going to be looking for awhile.

I've always been a fan of newspapers. Almost made it my profession once. There's no doubt the Internet has taken its toll, but the newspaper industry hasn't helped itself by adopting the death spiral as a business plan: cuts to maintain profit margin, product gets worse as a result, sales decline, then more cuts, product gets worse, sales decline, then more cuts...

[OldRightHander]

I have a few news apps on my ipad and I get plenty of content for nothing. I can't remember the last time I bought an Enquirer or even went to their site, so no big loss here.

[reds1869]

Setting the economic models aside for a moment, the editorial is correct about one thing. You can find a lot of things on the Internet, but if you're looking for local news and information and you prefer getting it from someone without a dog in the fight, you're going to be looking for awhile.

And you'll keep right on looking if you go to cincinnati.com for unbiased coverage of stories in anything from politics to sports. In fairness that is true of virtually all media, though.

[RBA]

LA times is going to free 15 stories in 30 days. Anything more and yo have to pay.

[Redsfaithful]

I find it really funny that the editorial is split into two pages, to produce more page views.

The Enquirer really is an awful paper. The last time I looked at it, it was mostly AP articles. The Dispatch in Columbus is similar.

I can't imagine that sales of the paper were ever the primary means of funding, I have to think it was always advertising and classifieds. I'm not sure why they think now is a good time to flip that. They missed the boat. Newspapers could have easily developed Craigslist, and very late too. Just 6-7 years ago Craigslist wasn't a huge deal in Columbus.

But to compete with Craigslist they would have had to have started with free listings (CL eventually started charging for jobs and apartment listings in certain markets) and that NEVER would have happened.

There's little vision in the newspaper industry, and they've spent the last 10-15 years cutting expenses to the bone to maximize profits, and gee now they're almost dead. Who could have imagined?

I used to think we'd be much worse off without newspapers, but I really don't know anymore. The examples of investigative journalism the editor lists there are pretty weak sauce. Three have political undertones, which leads me to believe motivated political bloggers could have done similar stories. I will give them the "serious questions about how the county protects children from abusive families" story.

But if he really could go on and on, maybe he should, because I'm not convinced.