Keeping Up with the Times

A January 25 article in The New York Times explained that The Wall Street Journal will continue its "hybrid" online edition. I have never been one to particularly seek out content from The Journal, but apparently many of the paper's true articles are "hidden" behind a paid subscription service while other material - editorials, video, etc. - are available for free.

According to The Journal's website:

Subscribers to WSJ.com get access to articles from daily editions of The Wall Street Journal for the past 90 days, organized by section and page, and may also view images of each section's front page. It's a quick way to find a specific story from the paper, or to scan page by page to make sure you haven't missed anything. Subscribers may also browse section front pages of The Wall Street Journal Europe and The Wall Street Journal Asia, with complete access to stories from those papers.

Nonsubscribers may view headlines from today's section fronts. Subscribe now to get full access to the full list of headlines and the articles.

The Times article goes on to say that this hybrid service may or may not really continue. Rupert Murdoch made the announcement on Thursday, apparently to the shock of certain anonymous News Corp. "officials." Murdoch had made an announcement in November that the site would become completely free. According to the officials, it is a decision that has not really been made.

While I can understand to some degree the exclusivity The Journal tries to cultivate - "[the firewall] also creates an elite audience of high-income business-oriented readers whom advertisers pay a premium to reach" - I worry about that attitude in the evolving media environment. As print circulations decline and the world goes digital, The Journal will really need to keep up with the times... and The Times. The New York Times used to follow a similar model but has since made all of its primary, new content free online.

The elite businessmen of today may very well be willing to pay for both a daily print edition and an online subscription for The Journal, but as my generation becomes the movers and shakers of the business world, I doubt the validity of this model. We are simply too accustomed to free content on the Internet. This is obviously a time of change, and I would hate to see such a well respected publication falter. To The Journal: I wish you the best.