so are you going to pay for online news journal access

[Joe Walther]

So glad to see you are back Joe, well wishes to you sir.


Yes tnj does wellwell for itself and isn't going any where.

No, tnj is going to start charging for online access. They will give people free roam for 5 articles per month on dol.com , after that you get a pay wall.

Log out on dol.com Joe, then click around and you will see what I mean.

I stand corrected, Chase. As well, I think it's a dumb-ass move on their part. I read the paid online edition daily. It's fast-moving, pop-up free, and easy as hell to navigate. If local management at TNJ thinks a 5-article test drive of their free online edition is going to entice people to pay full freight, they're sadly mistaken.

They'd do much better in the long run by providing a 1-week free access to their full-blown paid site. The current free version of Delawareonline.com is metastasized with pop-ups that virtually erode the most erudite of attention spans.

If they're really using this as a SAMPLE of the paid online edition, WOW, I'm speechless. They need to improve things considerably if they're going to use it as a teaser for the real thing.

[Erin]

I have not been on Talk Delaware since 2009...... I logged back on because of TNJ's new charge. Hoping I can find the significant news in the area on here.

[childOfLacroix]

The L.A. Times is going the paid subscription route as well.

Los Angeles Times launches new membership program - latimes.com

If I still lived in L.A., I'd do the $1.99/week with the Sunday hard copy paper option; that would be worthwhile. Although I stopped getting a daily paper a few years ago, I get the Sunday Inquirer for the coupons.

I'm not paying for access to DOL or the LAT at this juncture.

In light of so many newspapers going to paid subscriptions, I envision an explosion in itty bitty local "news" sites. Just about anyone can set up a WordPress blog and then invite people to come post on it.

[lewisjp2]

im not going to pay for that site with all the pop ups lol they really got some balls trying this

[Josef]

You know what's great about a pay site that still has pop up ads for revenue? All the people that would have clicked on them are driven away by the cost for access. So you have a lot less people clicking on the ads now. Great job guys...real smart!

[Chase]

It's tough to measure for sure, does the income from subscriptions make up for the loss in page views? Tough call IMO.

I would think they studied that, compared to other sites in their network, etc, and weighed their options.

Many forums like talkDelaware use ads to generate revenue and offer a subscription to remove ads.

[LozerBoozer]

Haha ha! good one! The News Journal is not good enough to lay on the floor for my dog to crap on. I wont go on their site anymore, they are a complete joke. For starters, the refuse to print the race of crime suspects. You'd think that they'd want to get teh suspects' description out to the populace so they can be an extra set of eyes for the police, but noooooo.... they let PC crap run their policy making. Their reporters are useless, there are more grammatical errors and spelling errors than in a 3rd grade book report.
They are a disgrace. The editors try to create these made-up 'scandals' to increase sales and it's not working...hence the switch to paying for the website access.
Within a year or two the News Journal will be a stinking memory. Good riddance.

Bwa ha ha ha ha ha ha !!

[LozerBoozer]

FYI, the Newark Post offers FREE access.... AND-- they print the COMPLETE description of crime suspects!!! WOW!! What a concept- printing the FACTS !!

[Joe Walther]

You know what's great about a pay site that still has pop up ads for revenue? All the people that would have clicked on them are driven away by the cost for access. So you have a lot less people clicking on the ads now. Great job guys...real smart!

This is not aimed at you, specifically, Josef. It's just that your post happened to present an ideal opportunity to clear up a seemingly popular misconception about a paid online edition.

People are going to subscribe to The News Journal, or not, for whichever reasons they deem justified. It's a matter of personal choice. This is still a free country where people may read whatever the wish to read.

As for me, I've read the publication for over 50-years... from the time it consisted of two separate newspapers (The Wilmington Morning News and The Journal Every Evening). Back then, it was owned, indirectly but in full, by the DuPont Company through a holding proxy called Christiana Securities.

However, not a single addition was cleared to hit the street until members of DuPont's Executive Council at 10th and Market Streets gave the OK. It's gone through a number of iterations since then, both before Gannett purchased it and since.

I have no vested interests in what publications anyone reads or doesn't read. I have full access to the e-newspaper simply because I subscribe to the hardcopy daily and Sunday editions. In fact, were it not for my wife demanding a hardcopy subscription, I would subscribe ONLY to the online edition at a monthly cost of $15... a virtual bargain compared to what I pay for other online newspaper subscriptions.

However, my point here is in clearing up what seems to be a popular misconception regarding the paid online edition. Several posters are under the erroneous impression that TNJ's past online exposure via Delawareonline.com is the same as its online e-newspaper edition. It's NOT!

When people go to delawareonline.com, at the very top left, they see LOGIN SUBSCRIBE E-NEWSPAPER. The e-newspaper is their paid online edition and you must subscribe to it at $15.00 a month. However, in no way does it even vaguely resemble the version that EVERYONE has grown used to seeing at delawareonline.com.

The e-newspaper is literally an electronic version of the hardcopy newspaper, including the same static, hardcopy ADS you'd see if you were reading the hardcopy edition. There is no way TNJ--or any other newspaper for that matter--will eliminate the ADS; and, the reason is simple.

Contrary to popular opinion, newspapers do not print the news; they sell advertising at notoriously high rates. And, to this end, they print whatever those who can afford newspapers will read, as long as it maximizes their advertising revenue: news, smut, gossip, personals, or whatever.

Conspicuously missing from the e-newspaper, however, are pop-ups because there are NONE. Once you load the e-newspaper, you see a graphic front page in the left navigation panel. You see a list of the different sections of the paper in the right navigation panel. You may navigate the entire paper via either panel or use the menu at the top.

Navigation is dirt-simple and quick. As well, the ability to copy and paste material you want to keep and save it to an electronic file beats the hell out of cutting articles with scissors and putting the stuff wherever, only to lose track of it later when you try to find it.

I think the way TNJ introduced the e-newspaper, without clarifying its complete difference from what most people had become used to seeing at Delawareonline.com, was a mistake. They would have benefited more by offering potential online subscribers a free, one-week subscription to the e-newspaper.

Here comes a pet rant of mine...

Every newspaper in this country seems to be endowed with a sprinkling of jackass executives, incompetent editors, and substandard news reporters. And, the TNJ is no exception; however, they're no worse than most others.

I've read articles by columnists (NOT reporters) and some op/ed columns written by writers who are so intrinsically stupid that they actually put into print what ONLY the most colossal of assholes are capable of thinking. The News Journal has its share of these as well. However, none of this applies to a majority of newspaper executives, reporters, commentators, and op/ed columnists, TNJ's included.

Now, the crap we all hear on the cable news channels (ALL of them), as well as on most present day issue-oriented radio talk shows is another matter, altogether. If we gave 75% of these pundits an enema, we'd be able to bury the lot of them, full remains intact, in a standard size shoe box.

Rant off...

OK, I'm going to take my medication, now! I promise.

[Joe Walther]

I have no problems with the viewpoint that newspapers should report race information relative to the crimes they report; I’ve read the same complaint from others, the bulk of them being reasonable people. But still, I’ve always wondered about the logic behind it.

I hate to use this as an example because many of them were just sheer-ass racists. But, back in the days before TNJ cleaned out most of the profanity and vulgarity from its news-front forums, the complaint appeared many times. But, going back over the archives, it does not seem to have come from that many DIFFERENT people, but rather it appeared OFTEN from a SMALL number of the SAME people.

Personally, I’m indifferent about a newspaper printing the race of a suspect. If it adds anything criminally and/or socially meaningful to the account, as opposed to simply stirring emotional feelings, I’m for printing a suspect’s race. Otherwise, from a civilian standpoint, the information is irrelevant.

By the time any newspaper has sufficiently completed its verification of a crime having been committed, to a point where they can go ahead and print the story’s details without incurring serious legal repercussions, the police are well aware of all the details of race via victim and/or eyewitness reports. And, the police have already begun the apprehension process.

The Internet is blanketed with legitimate sites reporting all sorts of crime statistics and analyses. I jog through those venues a couple of times a month. However, there seems to be an extreme informational drought regarding any verification of a correlation between newspaper readers capturing or giving reliable information leading to an arrest, let alone a conviction, of a suspect simply because a newspaper printed that suspect’s race.

While we read about instances where a couple of witnesses to a crime in progress—sometimes it may only be a single witness—subdue a suspect until the police arrive, such instances are relatively few in number. And, they never check a perpetrator’s race before springing in action!

But, no matter, the race of a suspect or suspects is irrelevant in terms of newspapers failing to report race details. It does not prevent the nation’s police departments from doing the job of investigating and arresting the suspects, since they knew about race details from the beginning.

So, again, I don’t understand the logic behind the criticism of newspapers employing standing policies of not reporting race information to the public. And, believe it or not, TNJ is far from the ONLY daily newspaper employing such a policy. As it stands right now, about 22% of the nation’s estimated 1,500 daily newspapers engage the same policy.

[daveindelaware]

I've never paid for online news, and I'm not going to start now.

What I find interesting, is that WDEL has recently started mentioning "free, always will be" type stuff in their radio announcements for WDEL.com.

Coincidence? Maybe.... maybe not.

[Joe Walther]

I've never paid for online news, and I'm not going to start now.

What I find interesting, is that WDEL has recently started mentioning "free, always will be" type stuff in their radio announcements for WDEL.com.

Coincidence? Maybe.... maybe not.

Dave, sometimes I think you could find something suggestive in a simple dial tone. I'M yanking your chain, of course.


But, in all seriousness, radio stations operate under an entirely different set of rules, as set by the FCC, that do not apply to newspapers. Because the FCC grants them a broadcasting license to broadcast over PUBLIC airways--there are no other kind--they are required, by law, to provide public services free of charge as part of the deal. If they fail to comply, they lose their license.

While radio stations are not required to post web pages, only an extremely dense station manager with a serious desire for radio-land oblivion would not do so in this often overwhelming information age. Not only is it a business-prudent thing to do, doing so provides an economical way of fulfilling FCC-mandated public service duties.

Neither WDEL, nor any other radio station of which I am aware, is going to charge for content access. Pete Booker and his family--past and present--have been loyal and good corporate neighbors to the citizens of Delaware, New Castle County in particular, for close to 100-years. And, this doesn't even take into account that WDEL is the ONLY homegrown radio station left in this county.

I listen to WDEL daily. Granted, I refuse to listen to the intrepid wind-bags (BOTH of them: Mascitti and Jensen), but I listen to the morning news with Peter MacArthur and Mellany Armstrong, along with periodic news and sports updates throughout the day. And, I wouldn't dream of missing Allan Loudell at noon each weekday.

And, on a side note, when Rick Jensen arrived at WDEL, he was a most welcome relief from the moronic antics of John Rago. And, in fairness to Jensen, there is no issue-oriented talk radio host in this state--perhaps even regionally--who is better at ferreting out local shenanigans the way he does.

While I agree with most of his political positions, it's only when he rambles into the national malaise implying, as he often does, that ALL Liberals are devil-induced and ALL Conservatives are God-sends that I turn my radio off.

[daveindelaware]

I only listen to WDEL on my drive to work in the morning, and my drive home after work. I get my news that way. (Not that I didn't already know that there was a shooting somewhere, a robbery somewhere else, a politician was found being "crooked" somehow, and another celebrity died of a drug overdose. I assume that stuff happens everyday whether the news reports it or not.) I don't usually catch any of the talk show stuff with the people Joe mentioned.

(Oh, and please don't mention dial tones. One got me in trouble when it called me a few weeks ago and suggested that I ... oh, wait. Nevermind. I promised the dial tone I wouldn't discuss what happened....)

[TrueBlueHen]

I gave the new plan a few weeks & didn't see any improvement over the old DOL site. There were still a lot of pop-ups & the site still freezes more than other sites that I use for news. I got frustrated with having to log in every time (again, due to their pop-ups) I visited the site. As it is, I prefer the print edition & have had a subscription for over 30 years. There is no option to get only the print subscription. You have to buy it all. Since I don't have a "tablet" & don't have a smartphone, I don't need the apps I had to pay for in order to get the print subscription. So, I called to cancel the subscription & had to spend more than 15 minutes on the phone as TNJ tried to do a sales job on me. It's been 2 weeks since the subscription ended & already I have used up my 5 free articles for the month -- mainly because the website freezing issue caused me to click on the same article 3 times in order to read it. This is commercialism at its worse at a time when people are struggling with lack of employment, high food prices & now high gas prices. Shame on you, TNJ!

[Chase]

Welcome true blue, hope you hang around. We try to post local news here as much as we can.

Also folks, the changing the url to 0 no longer works, seems they patched that hole.

[RobForaker]

Wdel ,WGMD,WILM will be on Talk Delaware Live, so you won't have to leave this site. Link will start around 15th of this month

[Joe Walther]

I gave the new plan a few weeks & didn't see any improvement over the old DOL site. There were still a lot of pop-ups & the site still freezes more than other sites that I use for news. I got frustrated with having to log in every time (again, due to their pop-ups) I visited the site. As it is, I prefer the print edition & have had a subscription for over 30 years. There is no option to get only the print subscription. You have to buy it all. Since I don't have a "tablet" & don't have a smartphone, I don't need the apps I had to pay for in order to get the print subscription. So, I called to cancel the subscription & had to spend more than 15 minutes on the phone as TNJ tried to do a sales job on me. It's been 2 weeks since the subscription ended & already I have used up my 5 free articles for the month -- mainly because the website freezing issue caused me to click on the same article 3 times in order to read it. This is commercialism at its worse at a time when people are struggling with lack of employment, high food prices & now high gas prices. Shame on you, TNJ!

First, I have no vested interests in anyone subscribing to The News Journal. My interest here is making sure we’re on the same wavelength. People may not want to subscribe to TNJ for whatever their reasons. And, that’s a matter of choice.

My point here, however, is that either we’re viewing entirely different paid online versions of TNJ, or confusion about the matter is metastasizing into chaos.

The fact is that TNJ’s paid online edition is called ENEWSPAPER. And, the only way you can get to it is by subscribing and setting up an online account. Are you already a print copy subscriber? If so, the paid edition is free; all you have to do is verify your account and set up a password.

If you are, or were, registered to receive the paid online edition, you will be asked to verify your name and phone number when you register your account so they can retrieve your hardcopy records. If all checks out, you LOGIN with a user ID (email address) and the password you established when you registered.

If all is well, the next thing you see at the upper right-hand part of the login area is Hi, (your name). Next to that you will see ENEWSPAPER. You have to click on THAT to get into the paid online edition, which is an exact duplicate of the print copy delivered to your front door.

The interface does not come near resembling the unpaid version of Delawareonline.com. Once in the navigation panel, you can scroll through page by page, section by section, or article by article.

It is an exact duplicate of the print copy of the newspaper. I read it every day. My wife is the only one who reads the print copy. There are NO pop-ups. And, it’s a fast load for the various parts and articles. When you read the print copy, you see ads on each page. You will see the same ads as you page through the e-newspaper because it’s a duplicate of the print copy.

As for your not being able to subscribe ONLY to the e-newspaper, I’m equally confused. If you bring up Delawareonline.com and click on subscribe, it takes you to a subscription page. There are two options. On the left, the option reads: ONLY $15.00 A NONTH (it’s a package deal and includes everything next to the green check marks). Just click on GET STARTED.

The option on the right reads: STARTING AT $15.00 A MONTH. This one goes as high as $25.00 a month and includes a subscription to the print copy, as well as electronic copies of coupons, and advertising inserts—in the same format as you’d receive them in the print copy—plus all the stuff included with the other option.

As for your difficulty with their customer service, I’ve always had the opposite experience (over 50-years and still counting). The phone personnel have always been professional. They’ve always treated me respectfully and with courtesy. And, this includes phone call-backs whenever I encountered a technical problem. Yes, they’ve tried to sell me something on occasion; but, all it ever took was a friendly “no thank you” from me to end the attempt.

Again, Delawareonline.com and the ENEWSPAPER are two different interfaces. The former is nothing more than an electronic advertising forum with news article interspersed. The pop-ups are seemingly interminable making the site move slower than molasses flowing up-hill in February. No one with a 3-digit IQ is going to pay $15.00 a month for this.

[Joe Walther]

Wdel ,WGMD,WILM will be on Talk Delaware Live, so you won't have to leave this site. Link will start around 15th of this month

What are you talking about... LIVE? Are personnel from these sites going to be broadcasting from Chase's basement? We can already listen to the live streams of these radio stations without leaving TD, and without the need for a link on TD. All of these stations stream live on the Internet. All you have to do click on a station's streaming function and then bring up TD.

It's not for me, of course. I read TD for the potential for interaction with sane people. The last thing I want to hear, while reading and/or posting here, are the meanderings of issue-oriented windbags constantly telling me at WHAT and to WHOM I should be addressing my rage.

[TrueBlueHen]

Until today, I didn't know TNJ had 2 different online versions. I always thought DOL was their online version & that is what I usually accessed when looking for local news updates. There is no option from TNJ for a print-only subscription, which is what I was interested in. The new print subscription involves apps for tablets & smartphones (which I don't own) plus the electronic version, which I thought was DOL. I usually accessed DOL at night to catch updates because I read the print version during the day. Logging in repeatedly was bothersome because it's not unusual for me to get interrupted when doing things online. And, the increase in price (along with the increases in food, gas & other amenities) required a decision to end my subscription. I have heard the same from others that when they called to cancel their subscriptions: the quoted full access price of $25/month would amazingly get negotiated downward. Too much funny business for me. I just wanted a straightforward print subscription for local news.

[RobForaker]

What are you talking about... LIVE? Are personnel from these sites going to be broadcasting from Chase's basement? We can already listen to the live streams of these radio stations without leaving TD, and without the need for a link on TD. All of these stations stream live on the Internet. All you have to do click on a station's streaming function and then bring up TD.

It's not for me, of course. I read TD for the potential for interaction with sane people. The last thing I want to hear, while reading and/or posting here, are the meanderings of issue-oriented windbags constantly telling me at WHAT and to WHOM I should be addressing my rage.

The daily WDEL news has been posted..