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The New York Observer

After Three Months, Only 35 Subscriptions for Newsday's Web Site

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January 26, 2010 | 3:04 p.m
James Dolan
James Dolan

In late October, Newsday, the Long Island daily that the Dolans bought for $650 million, put its web site, newsday.com, behind a pay wall. The paper was one of the first non-business newspapers to take the plunge by putting up a pay wall, so in media circles it has been followed with interest. Could its fate be a sign of what others, including The New York Times, might expect?

So, three months later, how many people have signed up to pay $5 a week, or $260 a year, to get unfettered access to newsday.com?

The answer: 35 people. As in fewer than three dozen. As in a decent-sized elementary-school class.

That astoundingly low figure was revealed in a newsroom-wide meeting last week by publisher Terry Jimenez when a reporter asked how many people had signed up for the site. Mr. Jimenez didn't know the number off the top of his head, so he asked a deputy sitting near him. He replied 35.

Michael Amon, a social services reporter, asked for clarification.

"I heard you say 35 people," he said, from Newsday's auditorium in Melville. "Is that number correct?"

Mr. Jimenez nodded.

Hellville, indeed.

The web site redesign and relaunch cost the Dolans $4 million, according to Mr. Jimenez. With those 35 people, they've grossed about $9,000.

In that time, without question, web traffic has begun to plummet, and, certainly, advertising will follow as well.

Of course, there are a few caveats. Anyone who has a newspaper subscription is allowed free access; anyone who has Optimum Cable, which is owned by the Dolans and Cablevision, also gets it free. Newsday representatives claim that 75 percent of Long Island either has a subscription or Optimum Cable.

"We're the freebie newsletter that comes with your HBO," sniffed one Newsday reporter.

Mr. Jimenez was in no mood to apologize. "That's 35 more than I would have thought it would have been," said Mr. Jimenez to the assembled staff, according to five interviews with Newsday staffers.

"Given the number of households in our market that have access to Newsday's Web site as a result of other subscriptions, it is no surprise that a relatively modest number have chosen the pay option," said a Cablevision spokeswoman.
 
Nevertheless, traffic has fallen. In December, the web site had 1.5 million unique visits, a drop from 2.2 million in October, according to Nielsen Media Online.

In the short time that the Dolans have owned Newsday, it's been a circus. When they were closing the deal to buy the paper in May 2008, they had their personal spokesman scream at an editor who assigned a reporter to visit the Dolans, seeking comment; there was a moment back in January of last year, when Newsday editor John Mancini walked out of the newsroom because of a dispute over how the paper was handling the Knicks; in the summer, the paper refused to run ads by Verizon, a rival; Tim Knight, the paper's publisher, and John Mancini, the editor, eventually both left.

The paper, which traditionally has been a powerful money maker, lost $7 million in the first three quarters of last year, according to Mr. Jimenez at last week's meeting.

In October, the web site relaunched and was redesigned. One of the principals behind the redesign is Mr. Mancini's replacement, editor Debby Krenek.

To say the least, the project has not been a newsroom favorite. "The view of the newsroom is the web site sucks," said one staffer.

"It's an abomination," said another.

And now the paper is in the middle of a labor dispute in which it wants to extract a 10 percent pay cut from all employees. The cut was turned down by a lopsided vote of 473 to 10, this past Sunday.

Things are bleak in old Hellville, the pet nickname some reporters have established for life on Long Island.

"In the meeting with Terry, half the questions weren't about labor issues, but about why isn't this feature in the paper anymore?" said one reporter. "People are still mad about losing our national correspondents, our foreign bureaus and the prestige of working for a great newspaper. The last thing we had was a living wage, being one of the few papers where you're paid well. And to have that last thing yanked from you? It's made people so mad."

Send tips and feedback to jkoblin@observer.com

More on Newsday:

GOP Congressman Calls Newsday "The Enemy"

Dolans Cut 5 Percent of Newsday Workforce

Post a Comment The Discussion

Good......

Let's hope this news sends a cold chill to the New York Times management, who has announced a similar model starting in 2011.

Here, there, and everywhere: If it's not free, I'll get my content elsewhere.

Karma

Sounds like this piece of bad news couldn't have happened to a more appropriate person/party.

Newsday

Newsday suks I live on long Island and I wouldn,t wipe my a$$ with there rag of a paper in the woods, I,d rather use poison Ivy. How could those people be so stupid as to think we all think like the rich and powerful. We are broke as a county and as a nation. Get the silver spoon out of there mouth and roll the window down on the limo and see what's really going on.

Logical consequences of behavior

For decades, Newsday with insulted law abiding gun owners and apologized for criminals.

It's now 2010 and American citizens increasingly realize why law abiding gun owners were concerned by those who advocated 'sensible first-step gun control - because the next step invariably is that of separating citizens from their liberty and posessions.

Publishers blame 'the internet'. The answer is more close at hand - their own words, piously intoned for decades, which demonstrated rank contempt for citizens who love liberty and detest Elitist experiments in 'socialism', knowing full well the inexorably disastrous outcomes.

Most of us ignored this stuff when it was free. Now they expect us to pay for it?

Paul Vincent Zecchino
Manasota Key, Florida
26 January, 2010

A No Excuse Boondoggle

Words cannot describe how great a blunder this decision was. There is no excuse or spin to explain why advertisers should not run and fast. Let me explain why. First and foremost the assertion that this was not intended to be a revenue generator is not true. Go back to the news stories about all news dailies attempting to charge for their content over the past year and you will find that virtually all organizations considering this approach were having trouble making ends meet in the age of the internet. Second to assert if you already have a paper subscription that you recieve this service for free implies that you are somehow paying off the 4 million dollar investment (to be more accurate I could call it a gamble) to revamp the process. However, do we see a huge spike in paper subscriptions? Where is the new readership that quantifies the value added? Thirdly, the assertion that if you have an Optimum Cable subscription you are receiving this service (at some cost added onto your bill) is far fetched. How many people have cable contracts with service obligations for less than a year? Less than 3 months? There's only so much cost that can come out of your cable bill to subsidize Newsday before people go somewhere else for their cable service. The bottom line is the only quantifiable revenue from this venture is $9,000. Now factor in that all the "freeloaders" (as some have come to call them) are gone and you will have advertisements pulled left and right. Just goes to show that you can't increase demand in a product by increasing the price.

just buy the damm physical paper

Then again why would you need to do that other than for the classifieds when you have the Post and Daily News to read, if its newsworthy in Long Island then those two papers will have it. I don't think Newsday will be around much longer.

Mr. Dolan is a Good Candidate...

to serve in the Obama administration. He's an incompetent leader who disrepects his employees and the people around him.

it's just poor management

so Jimenez says "...that the web was not intended to be a revenue generator, but rather to provide extra benefit to loyal subscribers."

yet they spent 4 million dollars on it?? Tell that to all of the Newsday employees that were let go over the last 2 years.

and then, after Mancini leaves, Debbie Krenek becomes editor. She played a major role in Newsday.com Nothing like promoting the incompetent.

Newsday - 35 Paid Subscribers

That's only 35 more than my site!!! And I don't even have one!!! Way to go Newsday!!!!

Not surprising at all

Might the paltry number of subscribers have to do with the unrelenting ideological spin? Newsday is for the detached from reality elite.

bye bye

Bye bye greedy Newsday and New York Times and its executives.

You should have stepped up advertising instead.

Newsday

When you treat your staff, workers and readers like garbage, you end up with what you deserve.

Newsday Hearts Illegal Aliens

Why on Earth should anyone pay for garbage like Newsday? Their left-wing bias is inarguable. They prop up illegal aliens as paragons of virtue while routinely bashing law enforcement and anyone else who oppose amnesty for criminals. Die in hell, Newsday.

http://www.myspace.com/newsdaysucks

Something in common with News 12

That's the same 35 people who miss News 12 after switching to Fios. LOL (which bring News 12 viewership to exactly... 35) Cablevision is a joke, their TV service is horrible. When you fail at your primary business, it can only bring down the rest.

Cablevision service

The buying of Newsday was as big a mistake as was their buying of The Wiz. The Knicks are also a joke.
From my own experience Optimum services are excellent. I have dealt with customer service only a few times in 10+ years with excellent results. Fios is expensive and their are termination fees. A look at their customer service rating in Consumers magazine tells it all.

Only 35 have registered to pay for Newsday online, which,

coincidentally, is the number of senior executives at the paper.

Nice preview of the future for the NY Times.

This is so rich I can't stand it

Most of the responders to this article are probably staff members at Newsday! LOL How else to account for such bitterness and attention to the details of the story, as if anyone cares about the goings on at Newsday! I don't know which is funnier-- the fact that only 35 people paid to go behind the firewall, or the total lack of awareness from Newsday as to what a fiasco that is! Can you imagine if Rush's site resulted in only 35 paid subscribers? The media would be laughing themselves silly! How sweet to see the liberal media get its comeuppance! hahahahahahaha!

Newsday Blows Bigtime....

This should be a like lesson as the one OBummer is getting...mess with Americans, they mess with you BACK

The *people* buy your stupid paper, so perhaps you should listen to the *people* for a change.

Your positions on virtually everything are 180 degrees out of sync with the inhabitants of Long Island, or for that matter anywhere USA.

Should you continue to not listen to your audience/readers, you will go the way of the Dodo...EXTINCT!

Too bad about your employees, but if they are the same liberal morons as the management, they deserve to also be out of work.

You very few writers on the staff who have some talent and are not liberals blinded by pseudo-utopia, get another job, folks...this pile of Sh** paper is GONE, gone...

___Born in NYC, Live in LI, and Armed to the Teeth...just try and come for *my* Census information....

/GL

And that's why we need gun

And that's why we need gun control, because of morons threatening to shoot federal employees for knocking on a door.

You are a total freak !

You are a total freak and a loser. I hope the FBI traces your ISP number, questions you, and then throws you in jail when they confirm what a psychopath you are. May you have many romantic evenings with Bubba and Tyrone in prison, psycho boy.

Your website

I had a partner who was a principal in a very successful major Colorado radio station in the late 60's early 70's. He told me Radio was most effective as an advertising media when coupled with print and billboards.
I would suggest that today, part of the print media is indeed the "Internet". Couple the "net" and your website with your print advertising and it will return your investment in a major way.
By the way... your newsroom person who said your website sucked..... was absolutely "Right On".

35 is big...

I know, because after a grueling 11 days of a new radio station on a 5,000 AM Radio Station in lowly Augusta, GA, waaaaaaay high up on the dial where the bandwidth is thin, 3w's 1480 El Puente dot com ,in high quality streaming stereo, en vivo - 1480, WGUS-AM has had web presence for eight days and FB presence for six. Having 221 fans after such a long ordeal has been a fight, and I am taking heart that we are only 631% more successful than TNYO. I know that wonderful Música Latina Contemporánea is only good for making people passionate and happy, so it is really gratifying that it is a lowly 631% more popular than this important paper online! Gracias!

Newsday has always had a double standard

In addition to what GLondon said about Newsday's double standard, wouldn't you NYC liberals also love to know that when (perhaps they still do own it) Newsday owned Hola Hoy!, the Spanish daily in New York, Newsday would throw up barriers to prevent their writers, photographers, editors, etc., from unionizing.

In true liberal spirit, there was one standard for the well-to-do white liberal yuppies, and another, cheaper, standard for "those" Ricans, Dominicans and Mexicans.

poor management

in the update it says:"A Newsday spokeswoman sends in the following statement: "Our strategy is proceeding according to plan. By focusing on providing Newsday and Optimum Online customers free access to a site with hyper-local news and utilities, we have a more engaged, increasingly local audience."

So, their strategy was to lose 700,000 unique users????? There you have it folks, Newsday management at its best.

Pathetic

If Newsday's content was premium quality like the WSJ people will pay.

Lefty groupthink swill is redundant and valueless.

What's needed is a

What's needed is a subscription service that combines various news outlets into package deals, like 100 news sites for $5 a week or 50 for $10 a month. There is no single news service worth $5 a week to average consumers. I think Apple may be onto something like this with its upcoming 'min-PC without a lid'.

They Just dont "get it"

The left wing journalists just dont seem to "get it" that people are not going to pay for their left wing extremist "journalism" no matter if it is in print or on the net. WAKE UP Journalists!! America's second revolution began last Tuesday with the Scott Brown win. It is time that you took a look at your failed propaganda and joined the movement for smaller, less intrusive government with less taxes.

35 Subscribers, Indeed...

If Newsday would just watch Glenn Beck every afternoon, they might learn something about what the country, business, and the "REAL" will of the People.
They seem to have lost their way out there in La La Land.
Watch and listen to Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and Fred Thomas.
There is a whole world out there that no one at Newsday seems to know about....

Hilarious

The Observer claims to aim its coverage to NYC's affluent and suitably educated. I wonder how significantly the commenters on this site, fist-waving to the beat of uneducated idiots like Glenn Beck and unnecessary distractions like repealing gun control laws, dilute the target readership. It's scary, and a bit disheartening. It might temper the snark for the right wingers posted to realize that Newsday, like all reputable journalists, covered the facts rather that reported on the fictional worlds constructed by the likes of Rush, Beck, Hannity, etc.

Newsday Blues

You gotta love the math. Only 35 subscribers means the entire staff of the Newsday Empire could fit in a school bus.

Either that, or the vast majority of their own employees thought it was a sucker's deal, too. That's a riot.

35 Subscribers, Indeed...

Progressives.... You need to listen to Glenn Beck on the radio and watch on TV. You might learn something about where the rest of the country is...

Duh!

It's clear what has happened here--Dolan has obviously put Isiah Thomas in charge of Newsday.

Another idea: Free and Deluxe versions of articles

Sites should offer 2 versions of articles. A stripped down, slightly shortened free version, and a "deluxe" version that goes in-depth. Features such as clicking to see big versions of photos, or leaving comments can be reserved for paying members. Archives can go a bit further, with images turned off for free users.

newsday

The frightening fact is there are 35 people runnin loose out here who would subscribe. Hide the children!

I agree.

Yeah, I agree. I don't care if a newspaper is Liberal, Conservative, or for the Clown Party. If they are so greedy that they will charge for online content, then forget them. I hope other newspapers will think twice before trying to pull this stunt. And, congratulations on your $4 million investment that is targeted to pay off $9,000 in a year. Where did you go to Business School, Sherlock?

Need $ for fuel for Gulfstreams

Well , they do need to fuel up all of the Gulfstream jets and Sikorsky helicopters that are based on Wrong Island. Nice try dolans.

Why would...

Someone pay for newsday?
Broncos

I think they ae exagerating the numbers

You mean to tell me there are 35 people in the New York area who are interested enought to read that rag. What do these people they do in their spare time? Talk about the glory days of Al Lowstein, Bella Absug, and those 2 broken down old men Les Payne anf Jimmy Breslin. That paer has always been a poor joke on journalism. God bless the elites another one bites the dust. Newsday won't be missed.

Newsday

I used to do the Newsday crossword puzzle and I miss it but the advertisers I used to encounter at the website probably miss me, too. I have a feeling that Newsday, like the Times, will see the light and go back to a free-use policy after the Dolans stop acting like fools.

Brilliant Board of Directors

I'm sure the papaer's brilliant Board of Directors must be scratching their head now wondering just how to earn an honest dime without a government sanctioned monopoly!! LOL!

Must have been nice tobe in cable business when there was no competition. Must have been nice to run a phone company or media compaany and walk with 30M or 40M of shareholder money after producing lousy results. And the US wonders why it is in the tank - it has idiots running its companies like the rocket scientists on the Cablevision Board of Directors.

What a bunch of has beens who never have have earned an honest dime in their life - just a bunch of golden parachute, government and public company looters pretending to be business people playing media mogul. Nice try losers. Your 35 subscribers shows just how mnay people care about the crap you've thrown at we the people so now you're all caught with your panties down. Try producing media people actually want then maybe they'll pay LOL!

LOL! Oh, you Libs never learn.

Hey, Conservatives!

Check out "Gore Lied", "HONK! If You Want Your Country Back" and other great stickers and stuff at www.keep2theright.com

Bye, Bye Newsday

I canceled my subscription to Newsday, but my wife reinstated it since she like to read the obits. Newsday currently provides each day about 4 pages of news, and 20 pages of sports. The news items I generally have already been aware of for 48 hours, and the articles are written by reporters seemingly using a list of liberal talking points, and propaganda techniques like burying embarrassing facts in the last paragraph.

I will not miss its demise, and the sooner the better. New channels will arise to serve Long Island more effectively, and fairly.

35 is a big number

Think the paper's website is bad, well the Dolan's cablevision programming is not far beyond - garbage, especially for the price. Only a matter of time. Netflix here I come!!

The People have spoken.......but the conversation, is NOT over.

You are next, OBSERVER. The Main Stream Corporate Controlled Horror Machine, which is almost wholly owned and run by the Military Industrial Complex, is crashing because less and less of us buy your PROPAGANDA. Lies and half-truth are all that is spoon fed the masses. Opinions to choose from....no original thought anywhere except the "alternative" media. Take 911 and the inconsistencies in the "official account" that litter the memory hole. Put options 6 times higher than normal, Marvin Bush, PEOC, drills on 911, black boxes, demolition of WTC 7, Thermite, 6 of the ten commission members calling it "a fraud" and "a coverup", 100's of gov't officials calling it a fraud..... I could list more but my point is, the official story is a tissue of lies with holes that you could fly a 757 jet through. If you guys are so "truthful" why don't you do a story about Japanese Parliament discussing 911? How about a writeup on the Bilderberg's or State Memorandum 200? You all make me want to vomit. If you want TRUTH and you want it EARLY, go to WWW dot INFOWARS dot COM

Come on, folks. NEWSDAY is a

Come on, folks. NEWSDAY is a Long Island paper.
Just about EVERYONE on Long Island either subscribes
to the paper, or gets their TV from Cablevision,
which owns NEWSDAY.

In other words, THERE IS NO AUDIENCE.
The only people who might want their website
are out-of-towners.

Fox

Could someone please forward this article to Fox news. No wait!! Let em die with the rest.

newsday and optonline

These people are living in a closet ,the only reason I have their cable is for the internet connection ,if I had a another choice in my area ,like Verizon I would jump ship in a heart beat.I am sure there is some hanky panky going on keeping Verizon out of most of suffork,Congrads Mr Dolan,you have purchased a big toilet paper factory

subject

35 really, but seriously why would anyone pay to read news online? it's not like its all over the internet for free with minimal intrusive ads, and if you don't like ads you don't pay to not see ads you just use AdBlock for Firefox or Chrome. They should let people who have actually used the internet more than once into the decision making.

Wait...let me get this

Wait...let me get this straight....you paid $4 MILLION dollars for a website?...that has to be BS....either that...or you've been robbed....or who ever agreed to that is the biggest idiot IN THE WORLD! Do you or your "advisers" have ANY idea AT ALL about the world wide web?...you guys are supposed to be good at getting/researching information...this was obviously a rip off....almost worse than wall street....my condolences....next time...try something called GOOGLE....

Tomtom29

I used to get the paper until the liberal bias became overwhelming. Both the stories and the photo editing were horribly slanted. When I canceled, they offered me the paper at one quarter of the original subscription price. I told them to shove it.

Then, because I am a Cablevision subscriber, I was notified that I could get Newsday.com for free. I took a look. It's horrible—too confusing and too slow.

We have local online newspapers that have better websites—
take a look at:
http://www.northshoreoflongisland.com/site.home.html

I'm sure it's cheaper to run. It's well organized and very easy to navigate. You can even get a PDF of your local edition. And it didn't cost $4 million.

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