TimesSelect Is A Failure
TimesSelect, the world's stupidest pay-for-content bar to a good user experience, has 222,300 paying members as of May, according to a report just released by the Times. This is, we think, if our math is right, a gain of 4300 TimesSelect paying subscribers since April! (That's income of a little over $200K.) This is such a good business model that it's impossible to describe how great it is, because it actually just sucks. Really—has no one calculated the web ad income per page contrasted with the cost of Times Select? Oh my God, sorry, I just got all crazy-dull trade paper on you right there. Also announced today—internet advertising up, print ads down over last year at the Times overall. Surprise! "Ad revenues for the New York Times Media Group decreased 9.1%" compared to last May. I bet someone upstairs there is thinking that they should make their website all-pay to play. Genius!