The Journal isn’t alone. “Everyone is trying to figure out how to make a buck on the Internet,” says media consultant John Kelsey. Playboy and the San Jose Mercury News already charge for online access to their publications. ESPN, the sports network, levies fees for such “premium” services as its popular $49.95 rotisserie baseball league. Publications continuing to offer free online editions aim to generate revenues in other ways. The New York Times, for instance, charges a modest fee ($1.50) for items downloaded from its archive. So do USA Today and the Los Angeles Times.
The common theme: giving subscribers services they can’t easily get elsewhere. For ESPN, that means instant sports scores. For the journal, it’s round-the-clock news updates, special reports and in-depth financial statistics. No one knows whether these gambits will work, but one thing is clear: publishers are finally giving people something they might be willing to pay for.
