My take with (hopefully) supporting logic.
Posted Aug 1, 2002 19:19 UTC (Thu) by
frazier (subscriber, #3060)
Parent article:
Is it really The End?
Here's my suggestions, which is not too far off base from many other comments:
- Delay release the weekly news by two weeks or one week (exactly) to the public. Why?
- It encourages subscriptions as a value-added proposition.
- People are creatures of habit, and there is value on having the weekly news come out on the same day whether there's a subscription or not. The Monday public release seems like an insufficient delay of time plus it would involve change for people when they become subscribers. Keep the Thursday morning element active but do not provide the most current edition to the public.
- It is far easier to get the average employer to sign off on a 'subscription' expense than a donation.
- The weekly edition maintains worth and exposure to non-subscribers with a two week delay, so you'll still be able to attract new readers while maintaing added value for subscribers.
- Consider reducing the staff by a person, at least temporarily. Yes, there will be a quality hit to LWN and it's hard to let good people go, but it will keep expenses more in line. Corbet must remain on staff!
- Merchandising!: Sell something like this mock-up of an LWN T-shirt for too much money ($20) with profits going back to LWN.
- No print edition. Automating a PDF version for paper-loving subscribers to print for themselves might be a good idea and perhaps an additional value added service. Printed paper editions will likely raise overhead beyond the gain from added subscribers.
- Allow for people to 'over pay' for subscriptions. Set a floor of $52 or $60 a year but allow people to spend more per year if they desire. Allowing for quarterly subscriptions would also be nice, and should cost more per time unit (maybe $18 or $20 a quarter). No trial subscriptions. The 2 week old edition plas back issues should sufficiently prove worth.
In short, run trim, make sure there is added value for subscribers while maintaining enough value to attract new readers, sell overpriced junk to people such as myself that would get a kick out of it and supporting LWN at the same time, and keep the same day of the week for weekly news releases for the public and subscribers.
Thanks for a wonderful service. People (like me) buy O'Reilly books and I'm willing to pay for quality Linux news too.
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