Opinion: Charging for archive access reduces readership

Posted by Lauren Drablier on October 16, 2008 at 4:08 PM

According to a recent article in TechDirt, newspapers that charge for access to their archives are hurting their bottom line rather than helping it. According to the article the idea of charging for archives only encourages people to go elsewhere.

The example provided was when The New York Times tried charging for archive access, but later realized that it made more sense to allow access to all of its archives for free. Since then, the NYT site has seen its traffic increase and the archives have become a more significant portion of overall traffic to the site.

The article also cites a letter to Toronto's Globe & Mail from Parker Mason discussing the policy of charging for archive access:

"But then you go and do something like trying to charge me $4.95 for a newspaper article that I've already paid for and read, and this hurts me (telling me that this content will only be available for 30 days only adds insult to injury)."

"The problem is, you are only half-right. It is valuable information, but only when it is easy to access. In the age of Google, people will quickly move on and find the information elsewhere, somewhere where it easier to get at."

Sources: TechDirt