Website Pay Wall Erected Today
July 28, 2016 at 4:25 p.m.
By Gary [email protected]
If you go to our website today, you will be able to access the home page and the landing pages of each section to check out the headlines.
Clicking on a story will take you to a place where you will be prompted to either log in or subscribe.
Print subscribers to the Times-Union have access to all our online content at no charge.
Simply log in using your telephone number – all 10 digits with no separators as in, 5745551111 – as the username and your circulation account number without the leading zeroes as the password. If you are not a print subscriber, you can easily become an online subscriber.
You will be asked to provide a username, password and email address. After that, you will be directed to a secure payment wizard form where you will be asked to choose the the type of subscription you want and provide your name address, telephone number and credit or debit card information.
After that, you will be able to log in using the username and password you created and view all of the online content.
Subscription rates and options are as follows:
One week – $2
Three months $15
One year – $50
We’ve decided, initially, to leave some of our content free.
Classified advertising, photos and videos will not be placed behind the pay wall.
In addition, the forms section will remain free. That way, you won’t have to be a subscriber to submit a wedding, engagement, birth or anniversary online.
We would like to thank our readers and advertisers for their understanding throughout this process. We know there have been some hard feelings and harsh criticisms regarding this move to a pay site, but there also have been some thoughtful and supportive comments as well.
A report last week from Pew Research Center survey said this:
“While local TV news remains the most popular source for local information in America, adults rely on it primarily for just three subjects -- weather, breaking news and to a lesser extent traffic. And for all their problems, newspapers (both print and on the web) are the source Americans turn to most for a wider range of information than any other source.
“Newspapers play a much bigger role in people’s lives than many may realize. Newspapers (both the print and online versions, though primarily print) rank first or tie for first as the source people rely on most for 11 of the 16 different kinds of local information asked about — more topics than any other media source.”
According to the survey, Between newspapers, television, Internet and radio, newspapers were the top source for news on community events, crime, taxes, local government, arts and culture, social services, zoning and development.
Newspapers tied with the Internet as the tops source for news on housing, schools and jobs.[[In-content Ad]]And newspapers tied with TV as the top source for local political news.
This was not surprising to us. We’ve known for a long time, regardless of how they deliver content, newspapers strive to give readers the information they need to make important decisions – from who to elect to what neighborhood or school district to live in.
Certainly, we try to entertain readers a bit along the way, as well, but our primary function is to provide valuable local content.
There are significant costs involved in producing newspaper content. After a long, tedious decision-making process, we have come to the conclusion that it is time to start charging a modest fee for that content.
Thanks in advance for your support.
If you go to our website today, you will be able to access the home page and the landing pages of each section to check out the headlines.
Clicking on a story will take you to a place where you will be prompted to either log in or subscribe.
Print subscribers to the Times-Union have access to all our online content at no charge.
Simply log in using your telephone number – all 10 digits with no separators as in, 5745551111 – as the username and your circulation account number without the leading zeroes as the password. If you are not a print subscriber, you can easily become an online subscriber.
You will be asked to provide a username, password and email address. After that, you will be directed to a secure payment wizard form where you will be asked to choose the the type of subscription you want and provide your name address, telephone number and credit or debit card information.
After that, you will be able to log in using the username and password you created and view all of the online content.
Subscription rates and options are as follows:
One week – $2
Three months $15
One year – $50
We’ve decided, initially, to leave some of our content free.
Classified advertising, photos and videos will not be placed behind the pay wall.
In addition, the forms section will remain free. That way, you won’t have to be a subscriber to submit a wedding, engagement, birth or anniversary online.
We would like to thank our readers and advertisers for their understanding throughout this process. We know there have been some hard feelings and harsh criticisms regarding this move to a pay site, but there also have been some thoughtful and supportive comments as well.
A report last week from Pew Research Center survey said this:
“While local TV news remains the most popular source for local information in America, adults rely on it primarily for just three subjects -- weather, breaking news and to a lesser extent traffic. And for all their problems, newspapers (both print and on the web) are the source Americans turn to most for a wider range of information than any other source.
“Newspapers play a much bigger role in people’s lives than many may realize. Newspapers (both the print and online versions, though primarily print) rank first or tie for first as the source people rely on most for 11 of the 16 different kinds of local information asked about — more topics than any other media source.”
According to the survey, Between newspapers, television, Internet and radio, newspapers were the top source for news on community events, crime, taxes, local government, arts and culture, social services, zoning and development.
Newspapers tied with the Internet as the tops source for news on housing, schools and jobs.[[In-content Ad]]And newspapers tied with TV as the top source for local political news.
This was not surprising to us. We’ve known for a long time, regardless of how they deliver content, newspapers strive to give readers the information they need to make important decisions – from who to elect to what neighborhood or school district to live in.
Certainly, we try to entertain readers a bit along the way, as well, but our primary function is to provide valuable local content.
There are significant costs involved in producing newspaper content. After a long, tedious decision-making process, we have come to the conclusion that it is time to start charging a modest fee for that content.
Thanks in advance for your support.
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