The Guardian is in trouble

two wheels good · 14-09-2016 11:26PM

mzungu wrote: »

Are paywalls the way to go? A risky move when you consider that the vast majority of news sites would need to adopt that policy too. Otherwise people will just go to wherever the free news source is on the web.

Although €49 is a reasonable amount, but it's hard to tell what way things will go.

I hope they don't resort to a pay-wall of any kind; even one with an allocated quota of articles per reader; and I'm speaking as someone who will get around to paying the subs eventually. Maybe the membership promotions will succeed and the pay-walll will be avoided.

There is reporting on the Guardian that can't be (easily) found elsewhere on free sites. Then there's the question of trust in the accuracy of those sites.

For example:
1.Today I see the G is, once again, the newspaper of choice for whistleblowers and civic-minded leakers. How many other UK, or IRL, papers or journals have reported on ALEC or the Koch brothers recently - or ever. (A serious question. I'm curious to know.)

2. I see other posters here praisng the G's Long Read series. Last week's article was by Ian Cobain on Britain's secret wars. He's also reported on topics such as state secrecy, spying, rendition and British state-sponsored torture recent and historical. How many other UK publications take on those topics?

Bob24 · 14-09-2016 11:36PM

two wheels good wrote: »

I hope they don't resort to a pay-wall of any kind; even one with an allocated quota of articles per reader

Actually those paywalls with allocations are counter-productive I think. People who want to read will get around them without paying (I don't read it much but I am told visiting the Irish Times in private browsing mode does the trick), and people who don't care about their source will just move on to something else.

In my view if they want a paywall to boost subscriptions they need hard restrictions on some premium quality content (not even a limited allocation) and free access to the rest of the content.

dublinman1990 · 01-10-2016 12:12AM

I find The Guardian is very well written in sections like World news, National news from the UK, Sports and the Media section.

I have the Guardian app on Windows 10. It work's & feels great.

I had read the column section before. The comments section is fine. Some of the commentators content I have read are grand.

The commentisfree sections can be bloody painful to read though. There was one lady I thought which was a bit snobby wrote a patronising but a funny article to laugh at. It was an article about kids saving themselves from watching Thomas the Tank Engine on TV.

The article was published two years ago. Have a read of it if you like.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jul/22/thomas-the-tank-engine-children-parents

I would be very sad though if the Guardian had to close it's doors. For me it's very good for keeping up with stories about the status of the BBC Licence Fee & the former Culture Secretary John Whittingdale up until Cameron had resigned as British PM. It's brilliant work on investigative journalism i.e. The Panama Papers should also be credited to be a masterpiece of journalism too.

feargale · 01-10-2016 12:59AM

dublinman1990 wrote: »

The commentisfree sections can be bloody painful to read though. There was one lady I thought which was a bit snobby wrote a patronising but a funny article to laugh at. It was an article about kids saving themselves from watching Thomas the Tank Engine on TV.

The article was published two years ago. Have a read of it if you like.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jul/22/thomas-the-tank-engine-children-parents

Jaypers, having just read the article, I knew they made a big mistake here when they abolished cenorship. They should get the Equality Authority working on Thomas the Tank!

Dr Jakub · 01-10-2016 06:00PM

The infamous Thomas the Tank Engine article...Rip Guardian it's time to put you out of your misery.

mzungu · 01-10-2016 07:13PM

dublinman1990 wrote: »

It was an article about kids saving themselves from watching Thomas the Tank Engine on TV.

The article was published two years ago. Have a read of it if you like.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jul/22/thomas-the-tank-engine-children-parents

Ha. That's quality.

(For the record, all the "villains" on Thomas and Friends are the dirty diesel engines. I'd like to think there was a good environmental message in there, but when the good engines pump out white smoke and the bad engines pump out black smoke – and they are all pumping out smoke – it's not hard to make the leap into the race territory.)

silverharp · 02-10-2016 09:30PM

The Guardian's Lindy West had a cracker of an article about fat people becoming a voting block, apart from the fact that they are unlikely to get off the sofa, the idea that one of their columnists claim to fame is being obese and promoting obesity what it says about their editorial management?

Pat Mustard · 04-10-2016 11:43PM

That Thomas the Tank Engine article is supposed to be satire, right??

It has to be deliberately exaggerated, doesn't it?

skywanderer · 06-10-2016 11:57PM

Nothing would make me happier to see the Guardian, the Huffington Post and Clinton News News CNN all gone. The Daily Mail, Breitbart, Zerohedge and Fox is real online reading for any real Man. Only Cucks support the leftist viewpoint.

Pat Mustard · 07-10-2016 01:33AM

skywanderer wrote: »

The Daily Mail, Breitbart, Zerohedge and Fox is real online reading for any real Man. Only Cucks support the leftist viewpoint.

Yawn. Go and troll some other forum. We're not interested.

K-9 · 07-10-2016 01:49AM

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Free news isn't free. It's designed to sell advertising and is compiled with this in mind. The reader is not the consumer, they are the product. The consumers are the advertisers so there is no accountability on the part of the content provider to the reader.

Indeed. I wonder how much Facebook, Twitter or Google give papers when somebody clicks on a link.

The Guardian would be a massive loss just for the range of stuff they cover. Bit like the BBC, in the rush to make money or even break even, we'll lose the quality stuff to the lowest common denominator output.

We already have market well catered for.

Private eye is thriving and it's a paper publication only so maybe that's the way to go.

ancapailldorcha · 07-10-2016 03:39AM

K-9 wrote: »

Indeed. I wonder how much Facebook, Twitter or Google give papers when somebody clicks on a link.

The Guardian would be a massive loss just for the range of stuff they cover. Bit like the BBC, in the rush to make money or even break even, we'll lose the quality stuff to the lowest common denominator output.

We already have market well catered for.

Private eye is thriving and it's a paper publication only so maybe that's the way to go.

While it plays it a little to safely regarding it's usual readers, The Economist seems to be doing ok. I've never read Private Eye. The BBC seems to be doing alright though but they have the advantage of being the state broadcaster.

Facebook's business model is built on advertising so, if anything, media outlets are paying Facebook for appearances in the "Trending" sections.

K-9 · 07-10-2016 05:25PM

Well I suppose Facebook would have to provide their own news if it doesn't use the Guardian etc., Google News the same. They've no product without news outlets.

Richard Hillman · 08-10-2016 10:32AM

I think their sports department is very good,in what must be a very hard environment to work in for men.

I'll pop the cork when they do go bust though. You cannot keep on alluding to men having a "rape culture" and expect men to keep on buying the paper.

Dr Jakub · 08-10-2016 11:14AM

Richard Hillman wrote: »

I think their sports department is very good,in what must be a very hard environment to work in for men.

I'll pop the cork when they do go bust though. You cannot keep on alluding to men having a "rape culture" and expect men to keep on buying the paper.

I'd say it's interesting alright being man at the Guardian. Having to be constantly on guard in case you say something that could be construed as racist, sexist, white supremacist, transphobic, imperialistic, that will cost you your job.

Lovely Bloke · 10-10-2016 10:05AM

Their sports coverage, football in particular, is second to none. From the actual written content to the really, really excellent Football Weekly & Weekly Extra, and all-tournament podcasts every 2 years.

James Richardson and Barry Glendenning must never go into the offices of the Graun, because PC Lefty Liberal they are not.

I've listened to the tech and music pods on occasion too, also excellent.

The Black Oil · 10-10-2016 11:19AM

In a recent Reddit AMA David Simon (The Wire, etc) said to pay for your news/journalism. I don't, currently. A number of broadsheet papers have weekly limits. I'm thinking of paying for something, more on the essay, analysis or opinion side. Maybe the New Yorker. Will see. I'm not sure if anyone has come up with the perfect subscription model. Perhaps if it was more like iTunes - e.g. you could pay for a song(s), or the album, say, 0.50 cent per article or something. Or is there better value in a flat monthly fee?

Lovely Bloke · 11-10-2016 11:38AM

I pay for The Blizzard, some of the names of the contributers there will be familiar to the readers and listeners to The Guardian's football coverage.

£3 a quarter.

Excellent journalism.

Joe_ Public · 11-10-2016 12:17PM

Lovely Bloke wrote: »

I pay for The Blizzard, some of the names of the contributers there will be familiar to the readers and listeners to The Guardian's football coverage.

£3 a quarter.

Excellent journalism.

The Blizzard is very good if you like reading about football alright. If I'm not mistaken, it has a pay what you want subscription rate (maybe it only applies for back copies though, not 100 per cent sure). I don't know how well that works in terms of revenue, but always struck me as something more mainstream outlets might look at. People can be surprisingly generous when they judge the quality to be of a sufficiently high standard.

goose2005 · 20-10-2016 05:24PM

skywanderer wrote: »

Nothing would make me happier to see the Guardian, the Huffington Post and Clinton News News CNN all gone. The Daily Mail, Breitbart, Zerohedge and Fox is real online reading for any real Man. Only Cucks support the leftist viewpoint.

you're the leftist. real men only read stormfront and back issues of der Sturmer

goose2005 · 20-10-2016 05:29PM

kunst nugget wrote: »

They probably had to print it in full after this ridiculous article…

As Lionel Shriver made light of identity, I had no choice but to walk out on her

Easily one of the worst pieces of excrement I have read on the Guardian.

What's particularly odd is that they freaked out a few weeks later when Elena Ferrante's identity was leaked - she had pretended to be from a poor Neapolitan seamstress's family, giving her writing real authenticity, when actually she was a middle-class German. The Guardian condemned it as monstrous sexism to reveal her identity (despite themselves printing tons of articles over the years to 'unmask' Bansky)

Dr Jakub · 22-10-2016 02:09AM

Womanchild gets triggered because someone else has a different opinion to her and has to leave the room...generation snowflake would be laughable except they'll be ruling over us in the near future.

grumpynerd · 02-11-2016 09:08PM

the daily mail is pretty good as far as it goes.

grumpynerd · 02-11-2016 09:09PM

Lovely Bloke wrote: »

Their sports coverage, football in particular, is second to none. From the actual written content to the really, really excellent Football Weekly & Weekly Extra, and all-tournament podcasts every 2 years.

James Richardson and Barry Glendenning must never go into the offices of the Graun, because PC Lefty Liberal they are not.

I've listened to the tech and music pods on occasion too, also excellent.

Id lose a leg or an arm to have all my football italia vhs recordings back from the landfill

grumpynerd · 02-11-2016 09:11PM

fits wrote: »

I'm highly dubious about the independent's owner as well. Son of a former KGB agent and attended the dinner where Gove convinced Johnson to back the leave campaign for brexit.

as soon as you said kgb I thought of yuri bezmenov

The Guardian is in trouble

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