KC Star paywall goes into effect in December

[kappa]

Paying for news won't be fun, but it's necessary, says Star publisher Mi-Ai Parrish.

http://mediakc.wordpress.com/2012/10/29 ... ive-dec-5/

[NDTeve]

Twitter will gain from this.

[KCMax]

The Rag is still free and has helpful hints on how to find discount moncler jackets!

[chaglang]

Twitter will gain from this.

If the last 24 hours have taught me anything, it's that Twitter is a horrible substitute for an actual news organization.

[NDTeve]

Twitter will gain from this.

If the last 24 hours have taught me anything, it's that Twitter is a horrible substitute for an actual news organization.

Agree that Sandy pictures have been brutal!

[chaglang]

Twitter will gain from this.

If the last 24 hours have taught me anything, it's that Twitter is a horrible substitute for an actual news organization.

Agree that Sandy pictures have been brutal!

Suit yourself, but I prefer something more substantial than "OMG!!!!!!!" and a link to a tiny, low res photo.

[earthling]

It says the mobile version will have more free articles. Can use on desktop by bookmarking this. I tend to use this anyway to bypass all the clutter...

http://m.kansascity.com/kcstar/index.htm

Some news sites have agreements with Google news search and allowing getting into some paywall articles. I've had some success if finding an article that is paywalled and then searching it in news.google.com. Opening it via news.google sometimes gets you in.

[lock+load]

The problem for the Star is that they just don't produce that much content anymore. I pay $10 a month for the NY Times, but there is more content each day than any one person could ever read. I would probably get throuh everything the Star produces in any day in about an hour.

For the Star to succeed online, they are going to have to keep the price low and invest in more content. I suspect the will do the opposite on both.

[smh]

The problem for the Star is that they just don't produce that much content anymore. I pay $10 a month for the NY Times, but there is more content each day than any one person could ever read. I would probably get throuh everything the Star produces in any day in about an hour.

For the Star to succeed online, they are going to have to keep the price low and invest in more content. I suspect the will do the opposite on both.

The Times puts out more content in a day than the Star puts out in a month. Granted they are different levels of newspaper, but still...

[NDTeve]

[/quote]
Suit yourself, but I prefer something more substantial than "OMG!!!!!!!" and a link to a tiny, low res photo.[/quote]

I was agreeing with you. All the fakes and photoshops. Maybe you need to follow less pop-culture tweets.

[KCtonic]

I agree that the KC Star has fallen quite a bit in terms of content, quality etc. But I still find it's one of the best (if not THE best) place to find local news, sports and regional info. I fear it's current owners may continue to grind it so far down that it may never recover though.

Despite it's decline I will continue to pay for a subscription to support the local newspaper. I should note that I only subscribe to the EStar version and read it on an iPad these days. I think they should have done the paywall long ago instead of the completely annoying pop-up ads that can't possibly pay them much in revenue. Newspapers around the country will need to evolve more and more if they want to survive. Even the NYTimes and WSJ will need to change as todays younger generations who don't often subscribe to papers continue to grow older.

PS: I frequent kcrag for additional local news-type stuff as well as the Pitch for local entertainment news. Both provide excellent supplemements to the traditional paper. Twitter/Google+/Facebook are poor substitutes for anything other than a "this just happened" kind of news imo.

[chaglang]

Suit yourself, but I prefer something more substantial than "OMG!!!!!!!" and a link to a tiny, low res photo.[/quote]

I was agreeing with you. All the fakes and photoshops. Maybe you need to follow less pop-culture tweets.[/quote]

Whoops, sorry!

The worst tweets in my feed last night were coming from an Atlantic Cities editor who was completely losing it.

[flyingember]

the star has a problem with going paywall.

1. all the tv networks offering the same news. the star even piggybacks on kctv for much of their news
2. papers have traditionally been advertiser driven and they already have among the most shady ads on the internet. what happens to their ad rates online if they have a huge drop in readership online like they did in print?

[KCMax]

the star has a problem with going paywall.

1. all the tv networks offering the same news. the star even piggybacks on kctv for much of their news
2. papers have traditionally been advertiser driven and they already have among the most shady ads on the internet. what happens to their ad rates online if they have a huge drop in readership online like they did in print?

The KC Biz Journal and the Pitch overlap news with the Star (in different ways) as well. For free (for the most part). The only original stuff the Star really produces is its long-form stories and its columnists, and both have been dwindling at a significant rate.

[KCtonic]

Circulation has really been going down for the last decade, but it's going down at a faster rate more recently.

"The McClatchy-owned newspaper reported an overall circulation of 183,307 (M-F), and 275,784 for Sundays. That’s a precipitous drop from the figures reported in March, which showed a weekday circulation of 200,365 and a Sunday circulation of 310,487."

http://www.bottomlinecom.com/kc-star-ci ... plummet-2/

[aknowledgeableperson]

given the content (or lack of) in the paper that is no surprise.

[KCtonic]

given the content (or lack of) in the paper that is no surprise.

Yet it's still so much better than cable news networks and even local TV news...

[KCMax]

Star endorses deceased judge

[GRID]

The Star is a joke of a paper now. I couldn't believe how much that paper has been trashed. It's tiny and half the "articles" are ads.

I get the Washington Post (paper version) and it's still a great paper, but what has happened to the Star may be the case with many mid sized city papers, although I have not really noticed it that much when I pick up papers when I travel.

It really seems like McClatchy has destroyed the Star. I pay for the digital version of the KC Business Journal (as well as a couple of other business journals in different cities). I guess I won't be reading all the terrible comments posted by joco people on the kc.com anymore. Might be a good thing.

[smh]

I've always thought the Star could right itself by focusing almost entirely on local and regional reporting. Throw in some national AP headlines just to make sure--but every article coming out of the newsroom ought to be about KC or the region. There are so many stories of interest I'd love to see covered in the paper. Hell, that's half the reason this forum is so valuable, we analyze (or try to) what others don't!