Stardate 20011002.0535 (On Screen): Salon has finally realized that it won't get many people paying for subscriptions when most of its material was being given away. But there will be a lot of wrong-headed analysis of this. For example, a lot of people will observe that Salon's readership will plummet. This is true. This is also
good; it means that Salon will spend less on bandwidth. (It also means that advertising revenue will drop, but that's already inadequate.) The real question will be whether the number of people paying for subscriptions rises. If out of every ten current free readers one buys a subscription and nine simply stop showing up, then Salon wins and will survive. If all ten go away, then Salon is doomed. This is, of course, a desperation move; it will be interesting to see if it works. I don't expect it will.
(discuss)
