CROSSPOST: Ezra Klein on the "New York Times" Podcast Paywall

Zero marginal-cost distribution meets real-world media oligopolists: who really pays? & for what?

Zero marginal-cost distribution meets real-world media oligopolists: who really pays? & for what?

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Ezra Klein:

Ezra Klein: ‘Hey! It is Ezra. I am here with some news about the podcast, about some of our friend podcasts here in the New York Times podcast ecosystem. The Times is going to be putting its podcasts behind a paywall in the next couple of weeks. That includes this show.

The way the paywall is going to work is that the first few most-recent episodes are going to be free. So if you are listening to the thing we just did, you are fine. But behind that, the archives are going to be behind a subscription. And if you are already a subscriber to the broad New York Times news product, you will input that information, and you will get everything. If you are not and for whatever reason you do not want to be, there will also be an audio subscription for about $1.50 a week that will get you access tp all the audio. So: us and the Daily and the Run-Up and Hard Fork and Matter pf Opinion and PopCast, the amazing work done by the serial team, and all the other shows under the New York Times umbrella.

There is a lot to say about this.

And it is always—I know, because I have been in these processes before—frustrating to see things you were enjoying for free go behind a paywall. And so I want to make the case that this is actually a good and important thing.

I have launched media organizations, and the thing I have come to believe more strongly than anything else over my now twenty-plus years in media is that if we cannot convince you that what we are doing is worth paying for, then the future of what we are doing is not going to be what we hoped. And, frankly, not going to be what you hope either. This is hard work to do. It is expensive work to do over time. The more you want to do. The bigger your teams of skilled journalists who are making their career in a place. You have to be able to pay them good salaries and make sure they can keep growing on the show. It's very much what I want for this show. We have amazing people on it. I want them to stick around. I want to be able to make this a place where it works for them.

If we cannot convince you to pay for it, we are stuck on one of a couple of things. The thing that got digital media really wrapped around an unwise axle in the 2010s was we were waiting on the platforms. And in the end the platforms took the money. If they control the audience, they control the money, and in the end it does not matter how many nice things they say about journalism. They want the money.

The New York Times, of course, went behind a paywall for most of its news content more than a decade ago. That was a very controversial decision at the time. It is proving to be a very wise one.

One thing I also know is true is that this is frustrating. If you have been enjoying the show and now you do not have a subscription, we are asking you to pay for something that you were not paying for before. And do I want to make sure that we are giving you something extra for that. So on my show, at least, we are going to start doing subscriber-only ask-me-anythings.

Hopefully there will be something regular that at least makes it feel like there is something, in paying for this you are getting something more than you were and something you would not otherwise be getting.

But I really do emphasize that I really do think this is worth it. It is worth it to subscribe to the Times which, in my view, is the best bundle in journalism. That is why I am here and why I am proud to be here. And if you just love audio, and that is how you do your news, I think there is a lot in the Times audio bundle that will be worth it to you too, and we will be highlighting some of that in the coming weeks.

As we get closer, there will be webpages I can direct you to about how the signup flow will happen. Apple Podcasts and Spotify have at this point really strong processes for signing up. They will remind you. And they will make it so that you know when you are hitting the paywall and you know how to subscribe or how to put in your subscription to get around it.

I wanted to make sure you heard from me about how all this is going to work. Thank you for your forbearance, and for at least hearing us out about it.

Thank you for the support that you have given us so far. And we hope we are going to make this worth it for you in the coming months and years… <https://overcast.fm/+AAoiPVAOrss>

There is a gesture that the paywall is actually good for non-casual listeners—that the listeners who will value the archives and so hit the paywall are also listeners who will value the paid-only ask-ezra-anythings, which will be worth more than the $18/year paywall audio-only price. But that is only a gesture…

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So what do I think of this?