Instruct: Given a question, retrieve passages that answer the question.
Query: What is a paywall?
A paywall is a method of restricting access to content via a paid subscription.[1][2] Beginning in the mid-2010s, newspapers started implementing paywalls on their websites as a way to increase revenue after years of decline in paid print readership and advertising revenue.[3] In academics, research papers are often subject to a paywall and are available via academic libraries that subscribe.[4][5]
On March 13, 2014, the entirety of the newspaper's Web site was placed behind a paywall. The paywall was removed November 1, 2016. The site had previously been behind a paywall for most of the early 2000s but that paywall was also removed. 
Attribute-based access control Content control software Digital rights management Embargo (academic publishing) Embargo (academic publishing) § Moving wall Freemium List of public domain resources behind a paywall Open access Paysite Pay what you want Sci-Hub TV Everywhere, a similar concept in which access to online television programming requires a subscription.
A "softer" paywall strategy includes allowing free access to select content, while keeping premium content behind a paywall. Such a strategy has been said to lead to "the creation of two categories: cheap fodder available for free (often created by junior staffers), and more 'noble' content."[24] This type of separation brings into question the egalitarianism of the online news medium. According to political and media theorist Robert A Hackett, "the commercial press of the 1800s, the modern world’s first mass medium, was born with a profound democratic promise: to present information without fear or favour, to make it accessible to everyone, and to foster public rationality based on equal access to relevant facts.".[30]
Many experts denounce the "hard" paywall because of its inflexibility, believing it acts as a major deterrent for users. Financial blogger Felix Salmon wrote that when one encounters a "paywall and can’t get past it, you simply go away and feel disappointed in your experience."[25] Jimmy Wales, founder of the online encyclopedia Wikipedia, argued that the use of a "hard" paywall diminishes a site's influence. Wales stated that, by implementing a "hard" paywall, The Times "made itself irrelevant."[17] Though the Times had potentially increased its revenue, it decreased its traffic by 60%.[10]
Some newspapers have removed their paywall from blocking content covering emergencies. When Hurricane Irene hit the United States' east coast in late August 2011, The New York Times declared that all storm related coverage, accessed both online and through mobile devices, would be free to readers.[51] The New York Times</i>‌' assistant managing editor, Jeff Roberts, discusses the paper's decision, stating: "[w]e are aware of our obligations to our audience and to the public at large when there is a big story that directly impacts such a large portion of people."[50] In his article discussing the removal of paywalls, Soderman commends The New York Times' action, stating that, while a publisher "commits to a paywall as the best business strategy for his news company, there may be some stories or subjects which carry such importance and urgency that it is irresponsible to withhold them from nonsubscribers."[50]
Professional reception to the implementation of paywalls has been mixed. Most discussion of paywalls centers on their success or failure as business ventures, and overlooks their ethical implications for maintaining an informed public. In the paywall debate there are those who see the implementation of a paywall as a "sandbag strategy" – a strategy which may help increase revenue in the short term, but not a strategy that will foster future growth for the newspaper industry.[13] For the "hard" paywall specifically, however, there seems to be an industry consensus that the negative effects (loss of readership) outweigh the potential revenue, unless the newspaper targets a niche audience.[24][33]
In June 2018, the "Star" announced it was implementing a paywall again and has the same restrictions as its previous paywall implementation.
In 2010, Thompson was hired as a Senior Editor at "The New Yorker." From 2012 to 2017, Thompson served as the editor of NewYorker.com, where he oversaw and managed the magazine's website. In that time, the number of monthly readers increased seven-fold. He also led the redesign and re-platforming of the site, the launch of the New Yorker Today app, and the introduction of a metered paywall. "What we're trying to do is make a website that is to the Internet what the magazine is to all other magazines," Thompson told Politico at the time of the website's relaunch in 2014. By the time the metered paywall was introduced months later, new subscription sign-ups were 85 percent higher than they had been the previous January. Thompson also wrote for the magazine, most notably a piece on his long friendship with Joseph Stalin's daughter.
Paywalls have become controversial, with partisans arguing over the effectiveness of paywalls in generating revenue and their effect on media in general. Critics of paywalls include many businesspeople, academics such as media professor Jay Rosen, and journalists such as Howard Owens and media analyst Matthew Ingram of GigaOm. Those who see potential in paywalls include investor Warren Buffett, former Wall Street Journal publisher Gordon Crovitz, and media mogul Rupert Murdoch. Some have changed their opinions of paywalls. Felix Salmon of Reuters was initially an outspoken skeptic of paywalls, but later expressed the opinion that they could be effective.[20] A NYU media theorist, Clay Shirky, was initially a skeptic of paywalls, but in May 2012 wrote, "[Newspapers] should turn to their most loyal readers for income, via a digital subscription service of the sort the [New York Times]" [21][22] Paywalls are rapidly changing journalism, with an impact on its practice and business model, and on freedom of information on the Internet, that is yet unclear.
In an interview with The Globe and Mail in May 2013, he said the new Frank would have a metered paywall, which would enable readers to read a few stories before having to pay "about 50 cents a day, or $15 a month." In the past two years, hundreds of publications, large and small, have erected paywalls. Bate pointed to Andrew Sullivan’s The Dish, which instituted a metered paywall earlier this year, as a financial model for the new Frank.
The obvious way in which a paywall restricts equal access to the online public sphere is through requiring payment, deterring those who do not want to pay, and barring those who cannot from joining the online discussion. The restriction of equal access was taken to a new extreme when the UK's The Independent in October 2011 placed a paywall on foreign readers only.[43] Online news media have the proven ability to create global connection beyond the typical reach of a public sphere. In Democratizing Global Media, Hackett and global communications theorist Yuezhi Zhao describe how a new "wave of media democratization arises in the era of the internet which has facilitated transnational civil society networks of and for democratic communication."[44] By placing a paywall on their international readers, The Independent hinders the growth and democratic quality of the public sphere created by the internet.
After completing the more personalized, engagement-oriented user experience, Frons oversaw the transition of adopting the paywall, and prefers to take an unbiased view on the matter. "Paywall or no paywall, our job, and the job of other news organizations, is to provide relevant news and information for our readers. To me, no matter what the model, the more people who read and are engaged with your website or your digital products, the better. So the recommendation engine just fits into our overall strategy of increasing user engagement.”
In February 2016, most of the English language version's contents were placed under a paywall to restrict access to most articles without a paid subscription, as the articles in this version of Delfi are supported by the Lithuania Tribune, which raised questions on implementing the paywall there. It is unknown if other language editions will be implementing the paywall.
Some implementations of paywalls proved unsuccessful, and have been removed.[15] Experts who are skeptical of the paywall model include Arianna Huffington, who declared "the paywall is history" in a 2009 article in The Guardian.[16] In 2010, Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales reportedly called The Times's paywall "a foolish experiment."[17] One major concern was that, with content so widely available, potential subscribers would turn to free sources for their news.[18] The adverse effects of earlier implementations included decline in traffic[19] and poor search engine optimization.[15]
The use of a paywall to bar individuals from accessing news content online without payment, brings up numerous ethical questions. According to Hackett, media are already "failing to furnish citizens with ready access to relevant civic information."[46] The implementation of paywalls on previously free news content heightens this failure through intentional withholding. Hackett cites "general cultural and economic mechanisms, such as the commodification of information and the dependence of commercial media on advertising revenue" as two of the greatest influences on media performance. According to Hackett, these cultural and economic mechanisms "generate violations of the democratic norm of equality."[47] Implementation of a paywall addresses and intimately ties the two mechanisms cited by Hackett, as the paywall commodifies news content to bring in revenue from both readers and from increased circulation of printed paper's ads. The result of these mechanisms, as stated by Hackett, is an impediment to "equal access to relevant [news] facts."[30] The commodification of information–making news into a product that must be purchased–restricts the egalitarian founding principal of the newspaper. Editor's Weblog reporter Katherine Travers, addressing this issue in a post discussing the future of The Washington Post, asks, "is digital subscription as permissible as charging a couple of dollars now and then for a paper copy?"[48] While subscription fees have long been attached to print newspapers, all other forms of news have traditionally been free.[49] The UK's Daily Mail argues that print revenue is unique because "people pay for the convenience of print in recognition of the special cost of production and delivery of a tangible product and because they purchase it whole."[49] Online news, in comparison has existed as a medium of free dissemination. Poynter digital media fellow Jeff Sonderman outlines the ethical tension created by a paywall. Sonderman explains that "[t]he underlying tension is that newspapers act simultaneously as businesses and as servants of the public’s interest. As for-profit enterprises, they have the right (the duty, even) to make money for shareholders or private owners. But most also claim to have a social compact, in which they safeguard the entire public interest and help their entire community shape and understand its shared values."[50] By implementing a paywall before experimenting with other revenue-increasing initiatives, a newspaper arguably puts profit before the public.
Some success in new models for paid content is being found in the use of paywalls, especially "soft" paywalls, which blend into freemium models. Newspapers, in particular, have been implementing paywalls in an attempt to increase revenue, which has been diminishing due to a decline in print subscriptions and advertising revenue. The approaches to paywall implementation range. For example, "The New York Times" experimented with a metered paywall, on which they spent a reported $40 million to code and took 14 months to implement. Other publications have turned to providers to implement a solution for them, such as Weekly World News, which announced in January 2013 that they would be utilizing a pay model.
There are also those who remain optimistic about the use of paywalls to help revitalize floundering newspaper revenues. Those who believe implementing paywalls will succeed, however, continually buffer their opinion with contingencies. Bill Mitchell states that for a paywall to bring new revenue and not deter current readers, newspapers must: "invest in flexible systems, exploit their journalists' expertise in niche areas, and, crucially, offer readers their money's worth in terms of new value."[14] The State of the News Media's 2011 annual report on American journalism makes the sweeping claim that: "[t]o survive financially, the consensus on the business side of news operations is that news sites not only need to make their advertising smarter, but they also need to find some way to charge for content and to invent new revenue streams other than display advertising and subscriptions."[34] Even those who do not believe in the general success of paywalls recognize that, for a profitable future, newspapers must start generating more attractive content with added value, or investigate new sources of earning revenue.[13]
In 2010, following in the footsteps of The Wall Street Journal, The Times (London) implemented a "hard" paywall; a decision which was controversial because, unlike The Wall Street Journal, The Times is a general news site, and it was said that rather than paying, users would seek the information without charge elsewhere.[10] The paywall was deemed in practice to be neither a success nor a failure, having recruited 105,000 paying visitors.[11] In contrast The Guardian resisted the use of a paywall, citing "a belief in an open Internet" and "care in the community" as its reasoning – an explanation found in its welcome article to online news readers who, blocked from The Times’s site following the implementation of their paywall, came to The Guardian for online news.[12] The Guardian since experimented with other revenue-increasing ventures such as open API. Other papers, prominently The New York Times, have oscillated between the implementation and removal of various paywalls.[13] Because online news remains a relatively new medium, it has been suggested that experimentation is key to maintaining revenue while keeping online news consumers satisfied.[14]
Ogden Newspapers Throughout 2014, Ogden Newspapers' daily newspapers were placed behind a paywall. The system displayed teaser headlines and the first paragraph of the story. Paid subscribers had access to an e-edition of the newspapers as well as access to the publications via smart phone and tablet apps.[58] Ogden's papers began removing the paywall in November 2016, in conjunction with launching redesigned, mobile and tablet friendly websites.[59]
In addition to publishing the "Orange County Register", Southern California News Group publishes "OC Family" magazine, "Coast" magazine, and the following affiliated weeklies:On April 1, 2013, the "Orange County Register" began providing its online content through a metered paywall. Most online content required a subscription, with the exception of local weather, traffic, Associated Press or non-"Register" articles, and a few select local news articles.
As of October 2015, the website does not have a paywall and online content is free. As of May 2018, the paywall has been reinstated.
The "hard" paywall, as used by The Times, requires paid subscription before any of their online content can be accessed. A paywall of this design is considered the riskiest option for the content provider.[24] It is estimated that a website will lose 90% of its online audience and ad revenue only to gain it back through its ability to produce online content appealing enough to attract subscribers.[24] News sites with "hard" paywalls can succeed if they:
The New York Times — TimesSelect The original online-subscription program, TimesSelect, was implemented in 2005 in an effort to create a new revenue stream. TimesSelect charged $49.95 a year, or $7.95 a month, for online access to the newspaper's archives. In 2007, paid subscriptions were earning $10 million, but growth projections were low compared to the growth of online advertising.[15] In 2007, The New York Times dropped the paywall to its post-1980 archive. Pre-1980 articles in PDF are still behind the paywall, but an abstract of most articles is available for free.[57]
Three high level models of paywall have emerged: hard paywalls that allow no free content and prompt the user straight away to pay in order to read, listen or watch the content, soft paywalls that allow some free content, such as an abstract or summary, and metered paywalls that allow a set number of free articles that a reader can access over a specific period of time, allow more flexibility in what users can view without subscribing.[23]
The Kyiv Post launched an online paywall in March 2013. The erection of the paywall became financially necessary because of the decline in print advertising in the newspaper industry generally, including at the Kyiv Post. During times of intense national crisis, such as the EuroMaidan Revolution and Russia's current war against Ukraine, the Kyiv Post has relaxed its paywall and made its coverage available freely for a limited amount of time. The website currently provides many categories of stories for free, including its aggregated content, its opinions and editorials and its multimedia offerings, including video, cartoons and photo galleries.