Miami Herald asks online readers for donations

[chloe]

MIAMI — The Miami Herald began Tuesday asking readers of its Web site to voluntarily pay for the privilege, a new wrinkle in newspapers' ongoing battle to increase revenue from their online operations.
A link at the bottom of online stories directed readers to a separate page that accepts credit card information. A short message thanks them for making the site "South Florida's most-read news destination on the web," and asks them to support the content.
The McClatchy Co. newspaper has cut hundreds of employees in recent years as the weekday circulation of its print edition has fallen by almost 25 percent in the last year to about 163,000 and 14 percent on Sundays to about 238,000, according to the Audit Bureau of Circulations. By comparison, the paper says 5 million different readers visit its Web site each month.
"MiamiHerald.com features all the coverage of The Miami Herald's award-winning print edition, plus breaking news and multimedia extras including video, audio, slideshows and searchable databases," the message reads. "If you value The Miami Herald's local news reporting and investigations, but prefer the convenience of the Internet, please consider a voluntary payment for the web news that matters to you."

http://www.wral.com/news/technology/story/6624875/

I subscribe to our local paper even though I could read it online. I take the paper to work and leave it in the break room and everyone reads it.

[Kathianne]

MIAMI — The Miami Herald began Tuesday asking readers of its Web site to voluntarily pay for the privilege, a new wrinkle in newspapers' ongoing battle to increase revenue from their online operations.
A link at the bottom of online stories directed readers to a separate page that accepts credit card information. A short message thanks them for making the site "South Florida's most-read news destination on the web," and asks them to support the content.
The McClatchy Co. newspaper has cut hundreds of employees in recent years as the weekday circulation of its print edition has fallen by almost 25 percent in the last year to about 163,000 and 14 percent on Sundays to about 238,000, according to the Audit Bureau of Circulations. By comparison, the paper says 5 million different readers visit its Web site each month.
"MiamiHerald.com features all the coverage of The Miami Herald's award-winning print edition, plus breaking news and multimedia extras including video, audio, slideshows and searchable databases," the message reads. "If you value The Miami Herald's local news reporting and investigations, but prefer the convenience of the Internet, please consider a voluntary payment for the web news that matters to you."

http://www.wral.com/news/technology/story/6624875/

I subscribe to our local paper even though I could read it online. I take the paper to work and leave it in the break room and everyone reads it.

I subscribed to 3 papers for over 20 years. One by one, I dropped each. Not because of online access, no. It was due to the editorializing within 'news' articles. First went the Sun-Times, I was still married when I dropped that one. Then went NYTimes, just couldn't, anymore. Actually that was difficult as it gave a certain panache with my neighbors. Then went about a year and a half ago, The Chicago Tribune. That hurt, really. The McCormick Foundation does great work with schools. I really wanted to be able to continue my 25+ year subscription, but alas, morals won out.

If I could afford it, I'd subscribe to WSJ, but that certainly is a case of I'll read it online.

[Gaffer]

All they would have to do is report the news, all the news, and stop endorsing lib agendas. Their subscriptions would shoot up dramatically.