Stardate 20010809.1731 (On Screen): Anyone want to place a wager on how much longer it will be before Salon packs it in and shuts down? The new clever plan is to start charging for use of their previously-free online discussion system. I seriously doubt that's going to bring in much revenue, though it may cut down on traffic (and thus bandwidth expense) by driving people away. And since they started selling subscriptions, they've managed to get less than 12,000 people to pay, which is pretty miserable. In the last year they lost $2.9 million, but they just found someone-or-other to plow another $2.5 million into the company. I think the only thing which could save Salon now would be a rebound in advertising rates, which seems extremely unlikely (to say the least). I give 'em a year, then they'll either shutter or get acquired by AOL (to counter MSN's Slate).
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