Slashdot Mirror
The Rise Of Reg-Only Media
cswiii writes "Following up his article a few weeks ago about the NY Times' loss of prominence across the online medium (previously discussed on /.), Adam Penenberg returns with a much wider assault on the
lurch towards reg-only content by Big Media as a whole. I just wonder what Margaret Thatcher would think about purportedly living in Beverly Hills..."
If you want the NY Times content without having to give up any information, then hustle down to the newsstand and actually buy a copy.
Hey, Windows users, there is no such thing as "forward" slash, there is only slash and backslash.
Remember how Radio Shack used to always ask for your name/address/etc. whenever you bought anything? I could buy a germanium diode for $1 and get asked the same thing as if I bought a $1000 computer. Registration for news content is like making people key in their address to buy a newspaper from a vending machine. It's just completely ridiculous and unnecessary.
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new t-shirts
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Register, and don't read it. The companies will see this in their traffic stats and realize that registration effects readership reach. They are after all driven by the number of eye balls that grace their sites.
Using fake data isn't going to help becuase it doesn't lower the traffic volume.
It's time for some "Virtual Boycotting"!
Isn't the whole idea of the Internet for information to be free?
I'm a firm believer in free media and such. i think reg-only media is a terrible idea and should never have evern started.
And i think making people pay for it is even worse... It's just a pain sometimes to have to register to see news and stuff.
Not to mention i'm kinda leary about it because usually they want an e-mail address or your address and theres no telling where all that ends up...
I still resent having to register for newspaper sites. I don't need to register to pick one up at the newsstand, why should I for the site? Demographics blah blah blah but its not like the Chicago Tribune is going to start covering Denver news if a bunch of people from Colorado start reading it. They're going to be about Chicago, no matter who reads it.
I'm just glad google news has a partnership where you dont have to register when you use their links.
Moo.
It exists, and is called Passport. There was a hue and cry over it because people were worried about a centralized source of information in control of Microsoft about who they are and where they're going.
Even if you fake the information, it'd be like a super cookie. The best way if he's concerned about privacy is the current way -- stop the computer from broadcasting its IP address everywhere he goes and give a different piece of fake information to every website.
Try not. Do or do not, there is no try.
-- Dr. Spock, stardate 2822-3.
Maybe, but I don't even see advertising on the Internet. I tune it out, like, say, Yanni in an elevator. I also don't understand why publishers aren't more concerned about the integrity of their data -- unless, of course, all they care about is the illusion of accuracy.
That is EXACTLY all they care about- the illusion that they can target the ads properly, so that they can charge more money for "targeted advertising".
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
It doesn't strike me as much of a "right" that I get to access content on my terms.
When you're in someone else's house, you play by their rules. Don't like it, don't register. Simple as that. It's on part of my rights that I get something for nothing.
Slashdot Moderation: From positive to terrible in 2 "insightful" posts.
in fact, several other media outlets may be carrying the exact same wire story or press release.
if I go to a site where I don't want to register (vast majority of them),I *don't*, I don't even use any phony info, I just skip it, and they lose a potential viewer and customer maybe, but I WOULD check off a few boxes indicating any type of ads that I wouldn't mind having on the page. I'm a normal guy, some gadgets and services interest me, I *might* go visit some companys webpage from an ad, just not ads that have zero relevance. Let ME pick, then you don't have to guess! Just give me a quick list to scan, I make my selections, then poof on to the content. No registering needed then, no cookies needed, no transfer of email address, no hard feelings.
The interesting thing is Radio Shack stopped the process, saying it was too annoying to customers.
Yet now even more places ask.
I don't just enter it I routinely give it out in person as my zipcode. The Minnesota Twins have no business knowing my zipcode and telephone number when I buy tickets. 000-000-0000 and 90210 usually gets a chuckle from the ticket salesperson sometimes it gets a scowl and a question. "I'm from Beverely Hills, our area code is 000."
The companies might not think it's all that intrusive but I feel that it is my god given right to give them whatever I want just as they feel it is there to ask me whatever they want.
Right now in Minneapolis you can get 13 weeks of the StarTribune for $1.00 a week. $13 for ~3 months of the weekly paper. To buy it from the paper box or the store will run you 50 cents a copy. Now even at the higher rate I don't see 50 cents as actually paying for the content. I would hazard a guess that the
Sera
Slashdot, where armchair scientists get shouted down and armchair theologians get modded up.
Even if only 25% of registrations are relatively accurate, that's still 25% better targeting of ads than purely random. The papers know this, the advertisers know this, and the pricing of ads reflects this.
Can I have my 5 minutes reading this article back?
Imposing Libertarian views on everyone online since 1992.
I always put into some smart a*s name and info, as do pretty much all my friends (80% of whom are IT types). So any demographic information is really crap. I tell my parents, friends, etc to do the same.
'Readership' I've probably created 4-5 accounts on the same site b/c I forgot the stoopid uid/pwd and just create another one if I really want to read something. I think any numbers about subscribers/readers are totally off.
People are busy and cautious. It puts people off - they don't want to give up any information (asssuming they are honest on the forms), or they don't want to be bothered signing up for a site that they don't even know they're interested in. Plus how many freakin uid/pwd combos do I really want to keep track of? Not many.
I think for posting to bulletin boards etc it makes more sense, so a-holes, harassers, etc can be handled. But when it's non-interactive like just reading an article, I don't see the point (as a user, I understand why the biz does)
If a site forces a sign-up, unless I REALLY need/want to read something, I'm outta there. Otherwise they never learn anything useful about me, other than maybe some generic machine location info.
My 2 cents anyhoo
'The unexamined life is not worth living' - Socrates
You still have to spend the time filling out the registration form, remembering the user id and password for that site, filling in the user id and password periodically when the cookies expire... what a hassle.
Everyone I know already uses a junk email address for these sites. That's what my hotmail account is for, anyway. But even Google Toolbar doesn't know that I'm 26 years old, female, interested in underwater basketweaving, etc...
Tepp
This is one more reason why anyone who cares about the content of the news they read should ensure that they read some non-corporate news sources.
As a reader, you should demand that your media keeps your interests in mind, not just the interests of people who want to sell you things.
Now for other sites, I would probably avoid depending on the amount and quality of content. I would certainly not waste the time to register for my local paper's website or something of similar value to me. If you don't think getting access to the nytimes for free is not worth the "hassle" of registering, boycott the nytimes. Otherwise, don't complain.
at a vending machine you're buying the newspaper with a quarter. How do you pay for it online? With information. Or (as at Salon.com) sitting through some advertisement. Advertisers want to know the demographics of the people seeing the ads. At Slashdot that's easy to figure out, at NYTimes or WashingtonPost it's not. Thus the registration.
Best Slashdot Co
The only unique content is in the editorials.
which are being replaced by Blogging.
No. Any idiot can blog their opinion. A blog is more akin to a 'letter to the editor' without any fact checking, formatting, editing and can be entirely false and/or bullshit or a troll or whatever.
Yes, they are called "average" people. You know: those people who don't know what Linux is, don't read /., don't know you can avoid spam, don't know they have a virus/worm. I know a LOT of people who have real logins for NYT and even pay for it just to get the crossword. Just as average computer users blindly open email attachments that contain viruses, they blindly use their real info when registering.
Even if only half of the registering people on NYT are putting in their accurate info, they are still able to target their ads extremely more effectively than from the almost complete lack of information they get from people buying on the street.
IANAL, but I play one on
The problem is that bugmenot-type services work better the more people use them -- having one such service is ten times as good as having ten individual services. That means it's centralized, and that means it's vulnerable. Stopping such services in theory is difficult, but stopping any particular such service is easy:
What'll happen once sites catch on? They'll hire someone like me to spend half an hour writing a script that queries bugmenot for logins to their site, and disables those accounts. Making bugmenot useless won't be very hard.
Perhaps what we need is a more anonymous version of Passport -- a site that knows how to sign up automatically to a large number of free-reg-required sites, with information that you give it one time. Then when you want to read the New York Times, you go to RegItForMe.com and say "please create an account at [www.nytimes.com] with my (possibly fake) info," which doesn't take any longer than using bugmenot. This way the pan-internet super-cookie privacy concerns of Passport are neatly avoided -- as far as each reg site knows, you're using a local account with them. RegItForMe.com knows which sites you've requested a login for, but not when or how often you go.
Does that sound feasible?
While most of us use fake email addresses and info (or always try slashdot as username and password first) I have seen lots of friends and family members input their real information into those websites. So while the number of people who know better than putting real info into online forms is growing, I would imagine that there are still a majority of users that don't know better. Untill my I can train people like my dad to put in fake information, the registration sites will still be effective.
http://www.popularculturegaming.com -- my blog about the culture of videogame players
Can't they use geolocation services like Maxmind, Quova etc. to verify entered information in most cases? If someone enters country=USA / ZIP=90210 and comes from Italy judging from his IP address, the server knows it got screwed and can at least drop the entered information. It doesn't have to deny access, but that way less crap would find its way into the database.
Okay, they want to do targeting advertisements. Then why do they need...
...my name? They only need this if they want to track what content I, personally, am reading.
...my home address? They only need this to send me junkmail and sell my address. They might want to know about where I live for demographical purposes, but they certainly don't need my house number and street name for targeted ads.
...my phone number? If they are just using it for demographics all they should need is my area code and maybe my prefix. Nope, they're selling this, too. Or at least using it to sell subscriptions.
...my DOB? Give me a break. That combined with my current address, phone, and name, all an identity theft needs at this point is my SSN. If they want to target to my age group, ask my age, or at most, the year of my birth. You don't need to know the exact date I was born.
Yours sincerely,
Elwood Blues
1060 W Addison
Chicago, IL 60613
Is a very small price to pay for free content. Besides, with portals like Google news, if there is a story you are interested in, there is a good chance that several other media outlets have written a similar article.
I agree, and would add that it would increase diversity, not decrease it. Everyone has a throwaway email account they can use for free regs, or can get one in 30 seconds. Its is *free* regs we are talking about, after all.
Yes, information wants to be free, but someone has to pay for it and if targeting ads is the price, so be it. I can always not visit the site. It's amazing how people will raise so much hell over registering to get free content, and then bitch about the ads. Holy Christ, its free, but its not "free enough"? I guess they would like to get unemployment benefits even tho they have never had and will not seek a job, too.
Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
Tough shit. I don't have to be a willing partner in some company's business strategy. I don't have to be polite to cold-call telemarketers, I don't have to be polite to door-to-door trespassers (that "No Soliciting" sign means something), I don't have to read all the billboards on the bus shelters.
And firms do NOT have the right to my identity. Not even for warranty purposes. Any company which refuses to honor a warranty with a purchase recipt can talk to me about it in Small Claims Court. They're not getting those stupid cards filled out and mailed in, and the store gets squat.
And if you phone me from my bank, credit card company, phone company, and so on, I'm not going to believe you're who you say you are. Especially if you call from "BLOCKED ID" and cannot transfer me to a supervisor.
"Fraudulent" implies the intent to obtain a benefit as a result of dishonesty. Since NeoSkandranon was quite willing to pay for the ticket - there is no reason he cannot give false information. His behavious is entirely legal and unless there are some hidden circumstances, definitely NOT fraudulent. It IS your God given right to tell lies and society would cease to function if lying became illegal.