Difference between revisions of "Paywall"

Revision as of 18:39, 13 February 2022

An online paywall is a method that creates a barrier to access online content that is surpassed using a paid subscription.^[1] Paywalls are commonly used by news outlets to provide their content in a digital format while still maintaining a subscription model, maintaining ties to the traditional paper news outlets of the past.^[2] According to a 2019 study, 69% of newspapers surveyed utilized some kind of paywall.^[3]

The term paywall is also used to refer to academic and scholarly articles or journals that require a subscription or other payment to access.^[4] There is debate and lack of consensus surrounding the moral and ethical soundness of paywalls.^[2]

History

Before the digital age, the business model employed by newspaper outlets was traditionally a system where content was sold to audiences, and audience attention was sold to advertisers which created a positive feedback loop with both markets growing over time.^[5]

In the 1990's, personal computers were becoming more commonplace in the American household. Companies initially created websites where they posted articles in an attempt to be involved in the digital scene; initially these publications were free, but eventually companies realized that probability would become an issue. After first attempting to use online advertising, publishers explored alternative revenue options. The paywall was one of these innovations.^[6] In 1996, The Wall Street Journal was the first national newspaper that created a paywall across the entire site.^[1]

In particular, after the recession in 2008 newspapers were motivated to find a method to protect print circulation (and get user data), and paywalls were a method they tested to do this. There was (and is) concern, however, that the implementation of paywalls would decrease user traffic thereby decreasing revenue from advertising.^[5] There is a tradeoff between ad revenue (driven by high reader counts) and paywall revenue (driven by a smaller number of subscribers) and companies attempt to find an optimal balance between the two where a paywall is not too restrictive where the number of page views decreases too drastically, but not too lenient to the extent that paywall revenue is too low. The effect of this tradeoff has encouraged the development of different types of paywall implementations, detailed below.

Classifications

There are various types of paywalls. They are typically categorized based on how they balance the offering of free content versus the offering of premium (paid subscription only) content. The most common sub-categories recognized by experts are hard paywalls, soft (metered) paywalls, and freemium (Combination) paywalls. ^[7]

Hard

A hard paywall is the most restrictive type of paywall. Content obscured behind a hard paywall can only be accessed when a user has paid the subscription or fee. The content is not offered via other channels: there are no free versions, limited free articles, and no free trials. A hard paywall restricts access to a site or service in its entirety: there is no free section. In some implementations, there may exist several tiers; each tier would allow access to increasingly more content for an increasingly higher price. ^[1] The Times is a notable news outlet that employs a hard paywall, which it implemented in 2010. ^[8] In this particular implementation, users are allowed to read approximately the first paragraph of content before being prompted to subscribe. The Times is still categorized as a hard paywall because no article can be read in its entirety for free; the only purpose of offering the first paragraph is to show non-subscribers the articles that could be made available to them.

Amongst those who question the ethical implications of paywalls, this type of paywall is considered to be the most unethical and restrictive.

Soft

Soft, or metered, paywalls allow access to some premium content for free while restricting the remaining content to paid subscribers. A common implementation of a soft paywall is a metered paywall which allows access to a particular number of articles per month, and requires payment to read more than this predefined number. This is a model that The Washington Post has implemented; users are allowed to view between 7 and 10 articles for free each month, and to view additional articles requires a subscription.^[1]

This method aims to be a be a balance between offering users free content and allowing the company to collect subscription fees. Soft paywalls allow companies to balance ad revenue and subscription model. As detailed in a 2019 study, the implementation of paywalls causes a general decrease in readership on the site for both page views and unique visitors.^[5] The decrease in site visitors as a result of a paywall will decrease ad revenue, but increase subscription revenue. Companies attempt to maximize their overall revenue by changing the restrictiveness of their paywall to balance ad revenue and subscription revenue.

Freemium

Freemium or Combination paywalls provide access to a mix of free content while restricting access to premium content. Sites using this model will usually offer a limited free version of their content; the premium (paid) version has additional benefits, such as higher quality or additional functionality.^[8] Some sections of a site may be free, and others may be subscription-only. This is different from a metered paywall. In metered paywalls, the limited amount of free content is drawn from the pool of premium content. In a combination paywall, the free content and premium content are entirely separate. The premium content only is behind a hard paywall; this differs from a site-wide hard paywall in that in this case content is selectively restricted. Therefore, it is not a true hard paywall.

Freemuim paywalls are typically only used by outlets that already have a large reader base with loyal consumers and a wide variety of content. Publishers have the power to decide which content is free and what is premium; a company might choose a couple popular articles to be offered for free in the hopes that readers will want to subscribe. ^[9]

Perception

Industry

Many companies see paywalls as superior to digital advertising, which can have problems and return little profit, except for very large platforms. Especially in the era of Ad-blockers, paywalls can be an attractive option for companies to generate revenue. Additionally, news outlets are more independent when they implement a paywall; they don't require reliance upon advertising companies (and incentive to generate traffic to serve ads) reducing the pressure to produce "clickbait" style content, which would generally encourage a high volume of lower-quality content, rather than a lower volume of higher quality content. ^[6] Alex Pareene argues that paywalls are necessary for quality, honest, solid journalism; this kind of journalism requires time and money that can't be supported without revenue that often comes from a paywall. ^[2]

Readers

Paywalls in Practice

News

The type of paywall (soft vs. hard) did not have a significant impact on the decrease in readership. ^[5] If the audience is more loyal, local, and engaged than the audience lost, they may in fact be more valuable for advertisers. ^[5]

List of the top 10 subscription-based news sites by subscriber count in 2019:

Academia

Many academic journals and articles require payment in exchange for access.

Ethical Considerations

There is debate between if and to what extent paywalls should be used. As expressed by Stewart Brand, creator of the World Earth catalog, when remarking on the value of information:

On the one hand, information wants to be expensive, because it’s so valuable. The right information in the right place just changes your life. On the other hand, information wants to be free, because the cost of getting it out is getting lower and lower all the time. So you have these two fighting against each other. ^[11]
- Stewart Brand

This quote documents the dilemma: news and information producers deserve reasonable compensation for providing valuable information to the public; similarly, people deserve equitable access to information.^[1] This debate is often central when considering the ethical use of paywalls in a democratic society.

The Online Public Sphere

Pay to be Informed

The New Republic author Alex Pareene articulates the argument that subscription models such as paywalls intrinsically select an audience that is seeking high-quality content, and have the means and desire to pay for it. By extension, this excludes people who would otherwise equally benefit from this high-quality content but are unable or unwilling to pay for it. ^[12]

Quality

Nick Thompson, an editor at Wired, claims that paywalls make online content better. When defending the decision of Wired to introduce a soft (metered) paywall in 2018, he says that "When you create a subscription business model, your incentives change significantly."^[13] He is referring to the idea that paywalls incentivize outlets to obtain the largest number of loyal readers that they can. This incentive results in higher-quality content that is original and unique. Without the income from paywalls, it might be less feasible for companies to generate quality content at all.

Power and Open Access to Information

Globalization has accelerated information production in an interconnected world in which research is done by scholars who are more diverse. However, some argue that paywalls diminish the benefits provided by this information production. ^[14]

Those debating the ethics of paywalls ask the question: who has the power to decide which information is obscured by a paywall? The answer, clearly, is content publishers. Those who argue against the use of paywalls cite the growing market domination of a few academic publishers, allowing them to set high prices. These barriers make it more difficult for teachers, economically-disadvantaged people, and policy-makers to access this information.^[15] Paywalls limit access to a small proportion of the population, who is able to use this access to further advance their privilege. ^[14]

When a lower amount of news content is consumed and a fewer number of individuals encounter quality news, like when a paywall is implemented, the knowledge gap between audience groups with financial and technological means to access high-quality news and other audience groups left with lower quality, less substantive free news widens. Additionally, research has shown how local news websites place their best journalism behind paywalls, which excludes users who are only able to access free content from benefiting from quality news the same way that subscribers can.^[5]

As articulated by the authors of a 2019 study,

Based on our findings, we argue that paywalls are not merely a media business matter, but more profoundly a matter of local democracy that requires attention from media politicians and scholars as well as media practitioners. As argued by Syvertsen et al. (2014) and Ots et al. (2016), there has been a general shift from cultural and political values towards economic and technological arguments in the policy discourse. As such, a growing understanding of the consequences of local newspapers’ attempt to build a business model based on digital user payment is necessary in order to provide important insights for the discussion of a governmental support mechanism to aid local newspapers in their business transition from print to digital and – perhaps more importantly – to stimulate the use of local journalism among citizens in a paywalled local media environment. ^[5]

References

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4} Shah, S. (n.d.). Understanding the Effects of Online Paywalls on Information Access. Oregon State University.
2. ↑ ^{2.0 2.1 2.2} Harvey, B. (2021, January 20). Should News Sites Have Paywalls? The Prindle Post. https://www.prindlepost.org/2021/01/should-news-sites-have-paywalls/
3. ↑ Simon, F., & Graves, L. (2019, May 9). Across seven countries, the average price for paywalled news is about $15.75/month. Nieman Journalism Lab [BLOG]; Newstex. https://www.proquest.com/docview/2251667383/citation/A0A2FC17C0744FF6PQ/1
4. ↑ Taylor, M. (2013, January 17). Hiding your research behind a paywall is immoral. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/science/blog/2013/jan/17/open-access-publishing-science-paywall-immoral
5. ↑ ^{5.0 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 5.5 5.6} Paywalls Impact on Local News Websites Traffic and Their Civic and Business Implications.pdf. (n.d.).
6. ↑ ^{6.0 6.1} The Ethics of News Paywalls—Center for Media Engagement—Center for Media Engagement. (n.d.). Retrieved January 27, 2022, from https://mediaengagement.org/research/the-ethics-of-news-paywalls/
7. ↑ Pickard, V., & Williams, A. T. (2014). Salvation Or Folly? Digital Journalism, 2(2), 195–213. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2013.865967
8. ↑ ^{8.0 8.1} Rußell, R., Berger, B., Stich, L., Hess, T., & Spann, M. (2020). Monetizing Online Content: Digital Paywall Design and Configuration. Business & Information Systems Engineering, 62(3), 253–260. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12599-020-00632-5
9. ↑ Paradise, J. (n.d.). Metered Paywall vs. Freemium: Which Publishing Model is Right for You? Slatwall Commerce. Retrieved February 13, 2022, from https://www.slatwallcommerce.com/resources/articles/metered-paywall-vs-freemium-which-publishing-model-is-right-for-you/
10. ↑ Ang, C. (2021, April 26). Ranked: The Most Popular Paid Subscription News Websites. Visual Capitalist. https://www.visualcapitalist.com/ranked-the-most-popular-paid-subscription-news-websites/
11. ↑ Information wants to be free … and expensive. (n.d.). Fortune. Retrieved January 28, 2022, from https://fortune.com/2009/07/20/information-wants-to-be-free-and-expensive/
12. ↑ Harvey, B. (2021, January 20). Should News Sites Have Paywalls? The Prindle Post. https://www.prindlepost.org/2021/01/should-news-sites-have-paywalls/
13. ↑ Johnson, E. (2018, February 1). Paywalls make content better, Wired editor Nick Thompson says. Vox. https://www.vox.com/2018/2/1/16957324/wired-paywall-nick-thompson-magazine-advertising-subscription-peter-kafka-recode-media-podcast
14. ↑ ^{14.0 14.1} Eaves, L. E. (2021). Power and the paywall: A Black feminist reflection on the socio-spatial formations of publishing. Geoforum, 118, 207–209. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2020.04.002
15. ↑ Gershenson, S., Polikoff, M. S., & Wang, R. (2020). When Paywall Goes AWOL: The Demand for Open-Access Education Research. Educational Researcher, 49(4), 254–261. https://doi.org/10.3102/0013189X20909834