By Staff Writer – Boonsri Dickinson (@boonspoon)

In this graph, you’ll see how The Times pages views have dropped since they asked readers to register before viewing content behind the wall. It’s the blue line. All of the other UK newspapers reported steady page views.

The readers haven’t had to pay for anything yet, so it is not yet know how lazy or stingy they will be when the paywall goes into full effect. According to Hitwise:

So, its still early days, but the conclusion so far seems to be this: since it forced users to register in order to view its content, the Times has lost market share. However, this decline has clearly not been catastrophic and none of the paper’s rivals has particularly benefited. Yet. The real test will come when people actually have to pay rather than simply register to view the Times’ content.

Hulu is also getting into the paywall game, introducing Hulu Plus for $9.99 a month. Brian Stelter wrote in The New York Times:

Hulu Plus amounts to a sweeping vision of the future of online, on-demand television viewing. Bypassing cable and satellite companies, broadcast networks are collecting money from viewers directly and allowing them to watch entire seasons of hit shows.

With 43 million monthly viewers, this expanded revenue model with ads and subscription, might pull in more TV shows into the mix.

Don’t worry, you’ll still be able to see recent episodes you already watch on Hulu. Hulu Plus, it will open up the variety of shows and the number of devices they can be watched on.

Hulu joins the exclusive group: announces paywall is a post from: TechStartups.com

If you don’t think that McClure is right on almost every point in his piece “Subscriptions are the New BLACK. (+ why Facebook, Google, & Apple will own your wallet by 2015)“, then you are wrong. It is that simple.

I’m not one to paint positions as black or white, understanding that the middle, the grey, is where the true answer to a position lies. But Dave McClure is right on this. The future is pretty cut and dry when it comes to being able to sustain a business online and that is to get paid.

Search and ad businesses are coming unglued at the seams as new technologies and consumption habits become mainstream. With these changes come changes in the revenue streams of Google and the mad cadre of web sites that suckle to their bosom.

Google will need a solution to stop the hemorrhaging of revenue that it is about to endure from the loss in search traffic from Facebook and Twitter. Ad displays from some of their top publishers will also decline as they begin to put content behind paywalls.

Google knows this, they’ve run the numbers. Why else have a Holiday onslaught of free wifi for the masses, scoop up dozens of companies and release a flurry of new products and updates in December. At the height of releasing all of their news TechCrunch had over 30 references to Google on their home page alone.

Publishers and digital good providers are going to want to use services from the brands that they have come to trust, like Facebook, Google and Apple. All of which already have payment systems that makeup components of their business model.

For Facebook and Google it is an ancillary element of their collective systems but one that they could devote resources to and create a stronger payment system from quicker than competitors. They could come to market with solutions for mobile payments (through acquisition) but most certainly integrate them more heavily into their products to get the bulk of the market share. Merchants will use their services.

When it comes to Apple, they’ve got this down to a science and are trusted by millions of people around the world. Apple is trusted with their credti, debit and PayPal account information. They’ve built a business around a payment system that is integrated into iTunes. Which, essentially, is Quicktime on steroids.

The revenue that can be generated by developing better payment systems that are of better use to merchants of all types, especially those purveyors of digital goods is something that these companies need. In the very near future, as we enter into the paywall years, these companies will find a way to get a cut. McClure is right.

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The Middle Will Win, But Dave McClure Is Right is a post from: TechStartups.com

I’m using the home page at GigaOm as of this moment for inspiration of this post. I’ve always admired the consistent high quality they’ve been able to produce over the years.

There are two posts on their home page, one titled, “This American Life” Tries a Paid iPhone App” and the other is “Subtract the Swearing and Dave McClure Has a Point.”

I read Dave’s obscenity laced post earlier today and left a comment. He’s right on the money. And like most people I rarely comment on blog posts. But his post about getting paid subscription style hit home for me. I’m doing personally and it works on many levels.

The first post on Om’s site about This American Life got my attention for the word ‘tries’. Just what are they trying to do with a paid app? There is no trying – they are doing it. And more power to NPR for going this route. I said it would be this way when CNN launched their paid app that people flipped out over. Media production has to be sustainable at a minimum to continue delivering the content that people enjoy.

My hope is that someone from the NPR HQ in DC will hit up Gigaom and read those two posts in succession and have the brain blast of the century and begin charging a monthly subscription fee for This American Life. Okay, so maybe it would have to be someone from WBEZ in Chicago, but regardless, they need to do it for the listeners of the show.

Funding a program of as beloved as TAL isn’t shameful by requiring a fee for the show. If it saves people from having to sit through hours of pledge drives, I am sure they would gladly do it. The rabid TAL fan base could no doubt support this show through subscriptions but many others as well.

This is the headline that I would like to see at NPR.org tomorrow morning when I wake up, “Dave McClure Swears This American Life is The New Black for Going Subscription.”

Thank you NPR, WBEZ, GigaOm, Dave McClure and the color black.

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The Pay Meisters Are Here – Misers Better Recognize is a post from: TechStartups.com

Today, TechCrunch let loose a road block ad that slowed all traffic on the great TechCrunch highway.

The response – users of the free site did the internet equivalent of honking their horns wildly by twittering up a dust storm of global discontent.

Good grief, nerds! You will get where you are going. And by the way, all that TechCrunch content you consume for free has to be paid for somehow.

This is one of those times that any non-publishing blustering dip stick with a Twitter account should be systematically blocked based on their previous tweets, an array of trending topic keywords and the sheer idiocy of their naive commentary.

Maybe a road block ad isn’t the way for TechCrunch to go but it is a start in finding another way to generate revenue. Anyone with a problem that TechCrunch is trying to get paid without charging customers for the 20+ tech related posts that they crank out everyday should shut up.

If this is a harbinger for anything, you whining dolts, it is a paywall. Any publisher would rather field complaints from a paying customer than deal with a freeloader’s snide remarks about how they run their business.

My two cents is to say that if you keep honking your horns on Twitter you’re going to end up with consequences that you think are even worse – like a toll system.

It would make more sense for TechCrunch to create that aforementioned paywall system instead of trying to sell “Premium” reports. Premium products and its ilk must die. They are an undue burden to publishers that already do something else much better.

The product that people come to consume everyday is breaking news. That is what TechCrunch does best. And it is delivered to the shelves fresh on the webernet highway.

10-10 Message Complete – Grumpy Smurf

The Great TechCrunch Road Block of 2010 is a post from: TechStartups.com

If the NY Times were an employee and they presented their wishy washy plan and timeline to create a paid model for content you would stop them and ask them to wait in the hall for you. Then you would apologize to your colleagues and exit the room.

The Times’ announcement today wasn’t an announcement at all. It reads more like a poor attempt to placate interests within the executive and ownership ranks than a concerted effort to move their business model forward.

The Times released an arbitrary date to put their plan in effect . . . 2011.

Ultimately, we recognize that the success of our ideas will be judged by how well we execute this effort in the months to come. That is why we are waiting until 2011 to introduce this new system. To pursue this new approach requires that we utilize the full energy and intellect of all of you. All that work begins today. As we said earlier, our goal is to create the best possible user experience, integrating many of our customer management systems throughout the Company. It will take time to get this right. – NYT Memo

This internal memo only highlights the resistance withing the times by certain parties to creating a paid version. Things change so quickly online that one year from now the landscape could be completely different. My only question about this memo is how will it read to the employees that don’t survive the next round of restructuring due to a lack of revenue?

The Times proves that they are not ready to lead journalism into the future. It appears that they are going to leave that up to Rupert Murdoch and News Corp. It is a sad day for the news business when the Times, a venerable powerhouse of news and stellar reporting decides to do absolutely nothing to help secure its future because it is concerned about about trying a new approach.

The Times looks weak and indecisive. That is no way to act when you are the front runner and seen within your industry as a leader.

The New York Times to Go Paid, Maybe, Well . . . is a post from: TechStartups.com

In keeping with the theme that content wants to be syndicated, not free – I wanted to a bit more explaining.

I’ve been reading up on ‘pay walls‘ and the arguments against them. I haven’t read one that has convinced me to the contrary that they aren’t necessary for publishers to exist today and in the future.

Culture

The real issue at hand and the one that isn’t being addressed by proponents of ‘keep it free’ is that they feel they are entitled to free content. It has become part of the culture of the web an ingrained in their psyche. I know that this is the internet that I participate in, where content flows. In fact it flows so freely, hardly anyone thought about putting a leash on it.

Business Models

Allowing content to cost nothing, see: free, for consumers is a viable business model . . . for the right the company. For most it isn’t as they struggle to maintain their revenues. Regardless of a pay wall they will continue to shrink and find niche sources of revenue, spinning off divisions. Small is coming, and that’s ok.

Audience

There is an audience for content that will pay. Anyone today touting their desire to have the largest audience by giving their content away for free is dizzy from their own self-indulgence or the fumes from a stack of freshly minted money they have to spend. This is a massive shift in media that can be summed up with the word above, small. The audiences will be smaller, but more engaged since they have a vested interest in value of content. The audience are consumers, users and patrons.

Technology

The technology to consume, use and patronize content providers grows every day with new opportunities for business models that capture the essence of it. The consumption devices are paid for. The services that keep them connected 24/7 are paid for – like 3G, internet and GPS. They are paid for because they are exclusive to those that can afford them and their usage is measured.

Measurement

Syndication is about creating the necessary mechanisms to transfer content from one provider to another with ease. The primary mechanism for this today is RSS. As a culture of free has reigned, it has been neglected as the most powerful source of measurement for publishers. Even the great Feedburner, a RSS metrics company purchased by Google in 2007, had only begun to work its way down from the tip of the iceberg.

At the time of their sale and now partial mothballing by Google, it is not individual syndicated content that is measured, it was and is the feed as a whole. I would assert that a primary reason Google bought Feedburner was to squelch the growth in syndication metrics that would allow publishers to accurately track their content across the internet in a technical manner. Current technology and new tools that pick up where Feedburner left off are the key to better measurement of individual content.

Not Free

A culture is paramount in shaping the worldview of those that participate in it. Commerce that is created by this culture is determined by its practices and what it values. The audience for that commerce depends on the technologies that will deliver it – be it a horse and carriage or gigabit ethernet. The item of value requires measurement to ensure that a provider can come back to the market another day.

Solutions

There are many opportunities for multiple business models to deliver syndicated content. What is takes is the open mind of publishers to the various ways that their partners will sell access to their content and better syndication metrics. As for business models – ad supported models will work, patronage models will work and hybrid models will work. The successes of those business models relys on the content they can serve and the expertise of the people managing them.

DISCLOSURE OF MATERIAL CONNECTION: http://cmp.ly/0

Content Wants to Be Syndicated, Not Free. Part 2 is a post from: TechStartups.com

This conversation about the next web and putting content up for sale through exclusivity has been a hot button issue for the last few days and worth some more thought. Notice I said, ‘exclusivity’ and I’m not calling it scarcity – because it’s not. Nor am I calling it a ‘paywall’.

‘Paywall’ being the prevailing label for this shift as media companies and independent publishers attempt to stay afloat and producing content by opening their doors to those that have paid admission. I will occasionally refer to it as such. I will also refer to it as patronage.

Like the arts or the movement to support local business, publishers of all stripes need revenue to produce content from information they have. If that revenue comes from their public supporters, so be it.

As an example, we pay admission to movies, concerts and meetups because we have an understanding that if we don’t there won’t be any more of them. Theaters would go away. Bands would lose their main source of income. Meetups would disappear or be held in some nerd’s basement with room for five people and a big OSHA FAIL.

The value that we find in the art of entertainment or having a few drinks with friends that share our common interests is measured first by the price of admission. It is measured second by the amount of pleasure we receive from the information, conversations and moving images.

Information is art. Information is a common interest. Businesses that are in information verticals require patronage.

Does this mean that all information needs to be paid for? Yes. Paid for by you? No.

There needs to be balance in the argument that content and information want to be free. They can be free to consumers, but someone has to pay for them. Whether is through advertising dollars, paid partnership or subscription fees, the production of the content from information is a cost. Content wants to be syndicated, not free.

Those that argue that content wants to be free can have their cake and eat it too if the places that they choose to get it from are covering the costs of production or aggregation. And in this case it is free to consumers if the business at the end point is covering its operating costs with advertising dollars, lead generation or other model.

But if the content is direct to consumers, patronage is the only way to guarantee that even a small portion of it will exist in a few years. Else, you should get used to content solely full of information about the stars you pay to see on stage and screen.

Photo Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/lolololori/ / CC BY-SA 2.0

DISCLOSURE OF MATERIAL CONNECTION: http://cmp.ly/0

Content Wants To Be Syndicated, Not Free. is a post from: TechStartups.com