Friday 16th July 2010

by The Content Strategist

A newspaper website has decided to charge a one-off fee of 99c before you can leave a comment, to improve the level of discourse. I remember reading Seth Godin (I think) on the big difference between 0c and 1c (i.e. as soon as a financial transaction comes into it, it’s a whole new game). I actually like the experiment, and it will be interesting to see the short and long term results. What I don’t like so much is the idea of giving over credit card details for something so trivial; hopefully they accept PayPal too.

Anxious to lift an outright ban on comments, The Attleboro (Mass.) Sun-Chronicle has begun requiring two things of online readers who want to leave their thoughts on stories: 99 cents and their real names.

Reasonable people may disagree with publisher D’Arconte on whether this step is necessary.  The benefits of allowing anonymous comments are well known and vigorously defended. But what’s interesting is that this newspaper has weighed the pros and cons of anonymity and decided that the costs outweigh the benefits.

via Paper to readers: Comments now cost 99 cents and your name | NetworkWorld.com Community.

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