Looks like USCHO is going to be changing to some kind of pay structure.
http://uscho.com/extra/
First the NY Times, now USCHO. What next, eLynah? ivyleaguespots.com? Seems like over time, the web will be completely based on payment and not advertising like over-the-air television. I'd don't really mind the ads, most of the time I don't even notice them. If it takes me an extra click or two to find my favorite team's standings or new stories, I'd prefer that over having the ads removed.
Boo.
The bottom line is that revenue generated from ads is a joke. Server costs are substatial and quality content doesn't come free forever. I don't hear anyone complaining that you actually have to pay money for a magazine. Websites have the added advantage of providing timely information in ways that print media only dreams they could. A nominal fee that offers value added content seems perfectly reasonable, especially since it's not like they're locking you out of news if you choose not to pay. Supporting USCHO with their subscription system will only lead to more quality content down the road.
Obviously it's a topic that hits close to home and it's only through the wonderful voluntary generosity of ELynah's patrons that this server stays up, but I'm the only one that has to worry about ELynah's costs. USCHO relies on many writers, photographers, and administrators, most of which graciously donate their time, but that can't always be the case.
If you feel strongly enough to complain, the content must be worth something to you, or you would just ignore it and never return to the site. I don't think a buck and a quarter a month is in any way unreasonable.
Ultimately, web media as a concept is still in its infancy, and sites need to find business models that work for them, whether they be donations, merchandising, subscriptions, wealthy benefactors, or ads. What works for some won't necessarily work for others, and in most cases it's not driven by greed, but just an attempt to stay afloat.
[Q]I'd don't really mind the ads, most of the time I don't even notice them[/Q]
Which is probably why they don't get much money for them and need some sort of subscription.
[Q]CowbellGuy Wrote: A nominal fee that offers value added content seems perfectly reasonable, especially since it's not like they're locking you out of news if you choose not to pay.[/q]
I too found it interesting that seemingly all of the current content will still be free (as was also the case when Goats.com added a premium subscription program - http://www.goats.com/forums/news/419.html if you want to read the press release I'm quite proud of). From the way they've worded the description, the only currently free content that I'm not quite sure will remain free is the message board.
Beeeej
[Q]Beeeej Wrote:
[Q2]CowbellGuy Wrote: A nominal fee that offers value added content seems perfectly reasonable, especially since it's not like they're locking you out of news if you choose not to pay.[/Q]
I too found it interesting that seemingly all of the current content will still be free (as was also the case when Goats.com added a premium subscription program - if you want to read the press release I'm quite proud of). From the way they've worded the description, the only currently free content that I'm not quite sure will remain free is the message board.
Beeeej[/q]
I think there will be a paid users forum separate from the peon forum. I have seen a few websites do it this way. I don't understand the appeal, but it seems to draw some people.
If USCHO isn't worth $10 a year to you, to supplement the entertainment you're already paying $200-500 a year for, why are you using it?
[Q]mha Wrote:
If USCHO isn't worth $10 a year to you, to supplement the entertainment you're already paying $200-500 a year for, why are you using it?[/q]Because it's free?
The problem with free things is that it's often hard to realize how valuable they are. I probably average only two or three visits to USCHO a month during the season, and I know it's worth $10 to me... but then, I'm used to paying for things I enjoy, use, or appreciate.
Contrast to Meetup.com's attempt to change from a model where everything was free to one where nothing was free, and local groups had to start paying $19 a month. Had they started offering two levels of service, one free and one for a fee with more features, they might have pulled it off. I think that approach will work for USCHO... at least better than an advertising model where no one clicks the ads.
[Q]mha Wrote:
If USCHO isn't worth $10 a year to you, to supplement the entertainment you're already paying $200-500 a year for, why are you using it?[/q]
I'd be disappointed if someone here were to pay $$$ for USCHO Premium while not kicking in anything to support eLynah.
Speaking of which, the start of a new season might be a good time to consider clicking the little "Donate" button on the left...you know, kind of like changing the batteries in your smoke alarm when you turn the clocks back.
I understand what you're aying and don't necessarily disagree with you. This experiment may work well for USCHO. But your original statement implied that the fact that people use the website and think it's valuable indicates that it's worth money to them. That's just not necessarily true. If there are other ways to get a fix of hockey information I might well use them even if somewhat less convienent. This is especially true for those with fewer financial resources.
There's also the question of charging for something that used to be free. (For the record, it doesn't appear that USCHO is going to do this, yet.) Example: internet audio for Cornell hockey was free for some time. When they switched to a subscription model many of us were upset and would have been even if the fee service offered better quality (which it did not). Expectations are involved. If it had always cost money to listen to Cornell hockey then I may well have gladly spent the money.
BTW, ESPN.com set up a two tier system of this kind several years ago. They have been slowly moving more and more content within the paid section. Eventually I expect that almost all of their original content will be pay only and at that point I will probably stop going to their website altogether.
http://www.collegehockeynews.com/
Still free :)
Or better yet,
https://give.redcross.org/
They need it more.
Amen.
The Red Cross needs my money; eLF, I can just buy a beer. :-D
Beeeej
[Q]Jordan 04 Wrote:
Still free [/q]
I'm wondering if the move to some pay-based content on USCHO had something to do with the emergance of College Hockey News?
The premium USCHO gives you access to the college hockey video game!
I never doubted for a moment that the web would sooner rather than later be dominated by the user fee model. What we should insist upon, however, is a fee structure which allows the user freedom from *all* advertising at some level of price.
For me the move to a user fee structure for the bulk of ESPN's online content did little more than help me realize how overvalued it was. One can find lots of things on the internet worth 10,20, or even 40 dollars a year; shoddy sportswriting isn't one of them. The various non-hack writers for USCHO might have been worth a subscription fee of some kind, but not when a few of them are now providing free content elsewhere.
I still wouldn't mind if USCHO showed up on, say, LexisNexis though....
[Q]CowbellGuy Wrote:
The bottom line is that revenue generated from ads is a joke.[/q]Tell that to Google.:-D
I'd put up the money on USCHO if they could find a way to link the polls the same way they link everything else on the site.
Why can't I click directly on a school-name in the polls and get to their homepage?
I've asked several times in the submit a comment, Wodon says it's the most commonly requested upgrade, but that it "just can't be done."
I don't get it. Perhaps I'm not web-savy enough.
Just a wild guess - but the polls are formatted as "preformatted text," so that they appear in single-pitch font. Any other format, and the columns (i.e., "record," "Pts") wouldn't line up. My wild guess it that you can't use any text that's preformatted as a link.
Beeeej
Nah, he's full of it.
http://www.brc.cornell.edu/age/prehref.html
Good point Beeej - strike that following Age's post.
I guess I'm spoiled by the magic that can make the "standings" on USCHO have aligned columns and links to the team homepages from the school names! ::rolleyes::
That's why I called it a "wild guess." I haven't been ahead of the curve - or anywhere near the curve, for that matter - on HTML coding since about 1998.
Beeeej
I think "just can't be done" means that they can't be bothered to spend any time on it. I can't imagine it would take more than a short amount of time for someone to write a Perl script to inset the appropriate links and retain formatting, even assuming that their exisitng script couldn't be used. Heck they could even put the poll results in a table instead of using preformatted...
Tables are sooo 2000.
For that matter, PRE is so 1993.
So why would they be using such an outdated format?
Perhaps they can hire SalsaShark.net to fix it. :-P
[Q]CowbellGuy Wrote:
Tables are sooo 2000.
For that matter, PRE is so 1993.[/q]Sorry. You might recall I haven't had a web site since around 2000... (most of the links are broken on my elynah server archives too).
[Q]CowbellGuy Wrote:
Tables are sooo 2000.[/q]
If you mean they've been replaced by CSS, that's true for tables (ab)used for formatting. But tables like standings are actually logically tables.
For the record, I never said that links from the polls page couldn't be done -- just that it would require an overhaul to how the polls were displayed. The poll page was not database driven - unlike most everything else there. That would have required time and energy better spent elsewhere.
In any event, I'm not there anymore :) ... I'll refrain from any specific comments on the topic that started this ... but generally speaking, I believe it's a very tough issue ... and each web site operator, and each person, must make their own decision as to what's worth it and what isn't ... and then let the chips fall where they may. CHN will have its own set of content and bells and whistles, free, and people must decide for themselves which content provider is worth it. The good thing is, the it doesn't have to be either/or. There is more and more college hockey content out there all the time, and that's a good thing. Hopefully, each provider has things make it stand out from the other, and everyone wins. If you poke around CHN, hopefully you'll find little things that make it stand out. And things are just getting started, so hopefully there will be more and more.
I, for one, am thankful that we now have a choice. Thank you, Adam, and everyone else responsible for CHN. (Which isn't to say that I don't appreciate USCHO as well.)