There’s been a hubbub, as we reporters call it. We also refer to such events as donnybrooks, brouhahas, kerfuffles, and to-do’s. See here for an archetypal example of such. But onward to my original point…
For the past couple of weeks, journalists and media experts have been kicking around more ideas than usual about how news should be financially supported. Here’s a good catalogue of the posts, articles, and interviews on the subject. Essentially, one camp of experts believe the industry should retrain its customers to start paying again — even if it’s just a dime an article. Such things are called micropayments, and we already use them for things like text messages (if you’re not on a flat-rate plan) and subway rides.
The other camp says no, information wants to be free. And they misinterpret this mantra to mean “free beer, not free speech,” when in fact, at least in cyberculture, it means the opposite. But nevermind; the point is that readers presently do expect to read things online for free, and most believe that news outlets of the world must keep it so.
I realize this is a literary blog, and here I am waxing on about journalism. Why? Because both journalism and literature are about “the integrity of the sentence,” to quote Pete Dexter, a writer who has worked in both spheres. Great stories hold enormous value to us, whether they give voice to the internal dramas of our emotional lives or reflect the external dramas of our daily lives. (Personally, I’d suggest that the best expressions of literature and journalism eventually meet at the same point.)
In both cases, that integrity has a real cost. The question is whether it also carries a real price that people will merrily pay.
It’s worth noting a significant distinction in this debate. Unlike every literary journal and magazine I’ve ever seen, held, or worked for, most newspapers have historically made money. Meanwhile, literary journals that have never applied for grant money are the Sasquatches of print media — the claimed appearance of such would be a scandal, and readily debunked. But today, even profitable newspapers are themselves beginning to resemble hairy giants spotted by your drunk Uncle Jethro on a Georgia hunting trip.
Where to from here? Some suggest all news outlets should operate as nonprofits, which many already do. Others suggest governmental support, “stimulating” or otherwise. And still others suggest we just go to the two richest people in the country and ask for a couple billion to right the ship.
But allow me to do something that many experts haven’t tried — put the question directly to you. See, more than a decade into ubiquitous Web access, this entire debate is actually a rare moment to start setting the price with almost total impunity. It would be like walking into your favorite market, holding aloft a ripe tasty pineapple and proclaiming, “Two dollars!” only to have the owner reply, “Are you sure? Can we interest you in paying just $1.50?”
I take T.R. Hummer’s wonderfully expressed point:
“It is useless to attempt to apply capitalist models to the conditions within which poetry manifests itself: how much gold is a ghost worth?”
But those ghosts must be sold, nonetheless. How else would we be haunted?
So begin calling out your price below: Would the readers of this blog pay for it? Would you begin paying for newspaper articles online, even if it was just a nickel a pop? Would you pay more for multimedia content? How much would you pay for a short story that moved you, but which wasn’t anthologized or available in print yet?
Speculate away!