The Boston Globe has lowered its paywall. It is introducing the metered model, which will allow readers 10 free stories in a 30-day period. After that, if they wish to access more, they must pay.
The paper's editor, Brian McGrory, said that the paywall had proved "successful" by attracting nearly 60,000 digital-only subscribers but was not successful enough. "The universal belief is that we can bring even more paying readers to the site with a meter."
In a long, very long, memo to staff, McGrory explained the change of direction. It was in September 2011 that the Globe put up its paywall on its site called bostonglobe.com.
Meanwhile, a separate site, boston.com - containing only some Boston Globe content - has been free to access and will continue. Both sites, according to McGrory's memo, will compete with each other for audiences.
Of the newly metered bostonglobe.com, he writes:
"We are betting that the more people get to sample our journalism – to read our stories, to view our photography and videography, to experience our graphics – the more likely they'll be to subscribe to the full body of our work."
Sources: Poynter/Jim Romenesko
