R. R. Donnelly buys JournalismOnline and its Press+ metered paid content model

U.S. printing giant R. R. Donnelly has made a strategic move by buying JournalismOnline's content project and, with it, the Press+ technology that allows publishers to create flexible pay models for digital content, according to a story in minonline. Stephen Brill, who had founded American Lawyer and Court TV and later Brill's Content before founding JournalismOnline, has been a champion of

We can live with the new Apple subscription model, says Transcon CEO

Apparently, a 30% subscription commission taken by iTunes, while steep, is something that the CEO of Transcontinental Inc., Francois Olivier says his company can live with, according to what he told the Montreal Gazette. Transcontinental Media publishes the largest number of consumer magazines in Canada. The new sub model will help newspapers and magazines  make money, Olivier says. Apple this

NYT said to be readying a charge of less than $20 a month for full online access

Though publishers continue to thrash around trying to determine what readers will put up with and pay up for content, there are some glimmers of a protocol emerging. This is illustrated by Bloomberg's report, quoting "a person familiar with the matter" that the New York Times will be charging readers less than $20 a month for access to its full web version. The price has been set at less than the

Yes, people will pay for online access, but how many? Turns out, not many

There's been precious little data to back up publishers' contention that putting up paywalls on their websites will separate the serious readers from the cheapskate rabble. Well, now there is some data in, from News Corp's Times and Sunday Times and, according to a post on Gigaom, the results are not pretty.Essentially, the two papers which had 3 million unique online visitors a month before the

Pay if necessary, but don't necessarily pay

Recently it was announced that the New York Times was going to charge visitors for access to its website, starting next January. However, a story in MediaDailyNews reports that Executive Editor Bill Keller of The New York Times said most readers of the paper's site won't be charged with access, reports Media Matters. The newspaper's new pay model launches next January. "Those who mainly come

Quote, unquote: Getting paid access right

"We can’t get this halfway right or three-quarters of the way right. We have to get this really, really right."
-- Arthur Sulzberger Jr., the publisher of the New York Times, on the announcement that the paper will charge for online access to its content starting in 2011. After accessing a certain number of articles free, readers will be asked to pay a flat acess fee. No price was announced.

Publications lining up with Journalism Online system

Pooh-poohed as it was at the start, Journalism Online, the system for helping newspaper, magazine and online publishers to make money from their content, seems to be catching on. More than 170 daily papers have signed on and more than 500 publications in total have agreed to join, representing more than 90 million unique monthly visitors.The company was created by several partners, including

International publishers ask European Union for copyright help

Straws in the copyright winds...A letter written to the European Union by a group of leading European newspaper and magazine publishers on Thursday asked for enhanced copyright protection to help them generate revenue online, according to a story in the New York Times. The publishers said widespread use of their work by online news aggregators and other Web sites was undermining their efforts to

High-powered trio setting up system to enable pay-for-content

Several longtime media players, including Stephen Brill (creator of Brill's Content, Court TV and American Lawyer) have launched a company called Journalism Online Inc. which aims to provide print publishers with the tools necessary to get paid for their online content.Along with Brill, the company includes Gordon Crovitz, a former publisher of the Wall Street Journal and Leo Hindery, who headed