Although our readership is still growing fast (see chart below), we need to make some changes to be able to deliver all our resources free for everyone. This full free access to our content is something we want to keep.
But 'free' is a tough path to be on. So we have made some changes.
From Saturday, March 1, you will need to be a qualified supporter to comment.
(Because everyone commenting from now on is a supporter, the green tick will be retired).
And you will need to be a qualified supporter to receive our daily and weekly email newsletters.
Most of our daily or weekly email newsletters include valuable data summaries along with links to the latest news articles that are relevant to that newsletter. This is a very convenient way to stay updated.
You will still have the option to read those stories free, and get that data free, by going to the site directly. But to get the email in your inbox, you will need to be a qualified supporter.
The standards for being a "qualified supporter" are not changing. They remain being a supporter in Press Patron at either a $10/month or $100/year level. And as a supporter, you can also participate as a commenter. Further, you can get an ad-free reading experience.
For those benefits, you must sign in using the same email address you use for your Press Patron support.
We love our supporters. They enable us to build and extend our service in a truly independent way.
What we are not changing is everyone's free access to all our online content*. That is still there. Long may it stay that way.
If you are not already a supporter, you can sign up here.
* Like in the real world, there is an exception. Some content we develop and produce for our subscription Banking & Finance Daily Newsletter will still be exclusive for those subscribers, even if we do post the headlines to our main website. Details of that specialised service aimed at senior financial industry executives is here. It is an email-only service, and does not offer special access on the website.
40 Comments
I’m still unclear about how you've assessed the additional value created by non-subscriber comments. For example, the feedback on bank interest rate offers has been insightful, but it will disappear along with other valuable contributions from non-subscribers - insights that were benefiting you at no cost.
What’s the underlying reason for this change? Was moderating comments from non-subscribers becoming too challenging or costly, and you believe that restricting comments to paying subscribers will offset the lost value? As I've mentioned before, this seems like a poor decision from a value standpoint.
Maybe 14+ years is an ideal reward timeframe, loyalty bonus :)
Sort of also feels like a time warp loop too. A ton of evidence that the status quo, certain economic and financial thinking, causes more problems than it solves. Yet house prices and interest rates still the no.1 topic.
The politics and division is worse and the quality of commenting has definitely gone downhill. It's become a lot like the social media pages.
Sometimes, likely too often, the commenting not only goes off thread but also off colour. Reducing the number of participants obviously reduces the time the editors and staff have to screen comments and provide more time for more productive work. If the unwanted type of comment remains too prevalent then perhaps the editors might introduce a three strikes and you are suspended discipline. At the end of the day this site is the livelihood of the staff and thus they have the right to decide on the content. Like it or lump it.
I've been making a token payment for years - but cant change it because my original email address had a dot in the wrong place. Any request for new password etc went into cyber space.
The Help responded but were help less. I was wanting to up it to the full amount.
Good luck with-the new approach.
The standards for being a "qualified supporter" are not changing. They remain being a supporter in Press Patron at either a $10/month or $100/year level.
Hmm. That's been my contribution for quite a few years now but I don't get the email newsletters.
That's okay, no big deal - as the commercial free aspect of my supporter benefits are perfect for me.
Personally, I find the comments to be of equal or even greater value than the articles themselves. I really like getting the feedback from the wider audience... but that doesn't justify getting these benefits for free. I've been a happy supporter for some years, and hope the articles and the comments continue to give me the value I seek.
If placing a payment barrier suppresses the opinionated but ill informed or commercially biased, then great.
Time will tell. I don't contribute much, but I'll still be reading your comments.
A certain % of commenters make really good comments, usually far more insightful than the articles. Dan’s are really good, but generally the articles are quite average. Couple that with sone quite misinformed commentary at times, childish political bias at times, and an editorial stubborness to reconsider things, and it’s a no from me.
But as I said the other day, I might miss the dopamine hit of commenting too much
Fully understand the need for the revenue model change in light of the current economic environment where advertising has likely fallen significantly and the need for business survival.
I'm assuming the subscriptions auto renew / automatically charges at the end of each period - i.e monthly, annually.
Subscription services make it easy to get in, difficult to get out.
Already have many existing subscriptions where the subscription service makes it difficult to cease / cancel - even cancelling the credit card number and getting a new one issued has not worked in several circumstances. Reluctant to sign up for more subscriptions for this reason. However happy to make one off donations as I have previously done with interest.co.nz.
Also for a non business consumer households, subscriptions to many subscription based services can add up very quickly. Already paying several thousand in subscription based services annually.
A big call considering there are many other places where it is free to comment online. I'm surprised it isn't that the articles are paywalled while the comments are open to all tbh. I'll still come here to read, though may lose interest if the comments drop away. I wonder how long an online community can exist when there is a financial barrier to entry.
Sure it's $10 per month, I was on the fence but I'm not sure. A regular long standing commenter (10 years tenure) with a green tick was implying that because I haven't yet subscribed that I'm a thief and I'm stingy.
When it's free you don't mind a bit of toxicity, but I value every dollar I get and I don't think I want to subscribe to a website that allows such drivel to go unchecked for so long (ever since the green ticks first rolled out).
"A regular long standing commenter (10 years tenure) with a green tick was implying that because I haven't yet subscribed that I'm a thief and I'm stingy. "
A commonly used sales tactic to intimidate / guilt a potential customer to buy by use of negative labels. Don't know if there is any undisclosed conflict of interest involved.
People are free to choose to entirely ignore the sales tactic being used.
It's called negging. Subtly insult people, frame their lack of a green tick as a moral failing and hope people cave in to the psychological pressure.
Yvil the interest.co resident street vendor.
If there's not a conflict of interest, then maybe he's trying to score brownie points incase one day David's looking for a site community moderator.
Interest.co is a unique website where you can establish an online personality that is New Zealand centric. We should have more sympathy for the site owners because of this. I doubt they are getting rich off it and more advertisers are likely to be cutting back. The minimum payment is very low per day although I know some will have partners that might resist. The payment says INTERESTCONZ so it may get overlooked as some sort of bank fee.
I beg of you to consider helping out your fellow Kiwi content creators. You may even get a personal service. More than once I have been called into the office (virtually) to get a telling off and once was sent to the naughty room for a month or so. Yet I still pay my dues.
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