@Moss But what is the alternative to paywalls? I can...

But what is the alternative to paywalls?
I can think of only 4:

1) Ad supported sites
2) unpaid Journalists who are independently wealthy
3) User supported journalism (like NPR or "pay what you want sites")
4) micro payment supported sites

#1 is by far the largest business model, and it is full of problems.

I would love to see #4 but it hasn't seemed to work yet. Rather than subscribe to 4-9 sites, id rather put $100 into an account that I could read *any* article for a few pennies.

Like 1 September at 2:36 | Wall-to-wall | Open on hachyderm.io

3 comments

vashbear

@Moss

Good journalism, good writing, good research is valuable. If you don't want to pay for it then, I am afraid you get what you pay for: usually "crap"

1 September at 2:41 | Open on hachyderm.io

Fish Id Wardrobe

@vashbear @Moss That does not mean I have to pay for access to every random site folks on here link to?

1 September at 3:01 | Open on social.tchncs.de

Arthur Detoo

@vashbear @Moss there's a 5th: public funding. this doesn't mean "government run propaganda outlets", the money can be distributed by an independent trust which is essentially where a big chunk of NPR and PBS funding comes from via the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. The BBC is another example. Both NPR and BBC do some of the best journalism in the world imo and we should use this model a lot more. Journalism is a public good and the public should fund it accordingly

2 September at 1:11 | Open on dads.cool