July 18th, 2006 by Mrs Eaves
So, it appears that the Oak Ridger and News-Sentinel are now charging folks to access online articles more than 1 week old.
According to both websites, the rates are as follows:
- Single Article: $2.95 per article
- 3 Pack: $6.95, one week duration
- 10 Pack: $21.95, one month duration
- 25 Pack: $49.95, one month duration
- 40 Pack: $79.95, one month duration
- 500 Pack: $995, one year duration
- 1,000 Pack: $1,995, one year duration
Wow! Almost $2,000 a year, and you don’t even get unlimited access! One side note, however: the Oak Ridger site states that “unlimited free access is available to print subscribers.”
I’m not sure when this system began, or if it’s following a national trend. Is it a ploy to increase the number of print subscribers in an attempt to increase print ad sales? It seems to me that the cost of digitally archiving and storing articles could easily be covered by the many, many online advertisements I run across visiting both these sites.Â
Interestingly enough, locally-owned and operated Oak Ridger Observer has PDF versions of all its previous issues located on its website. It doesn’t appear that these are searchable through the website itself, but it says a lot that they’re there and they’re free.
July 18th, 2006 at 1:20 pm
What a steaming pile of crap. I could maybe, maybe see charging for access, but $2.95 for one article? Maybe if I were going to use all or some of said article in a paper, but not just to read it. That’s ridiculous.
July 18th, 2006 at 1:52 pm
I noticed this a couple weeks ago. I found it humorous that a press release I wrote and submitted to the Oakridger, which was published in whole without rewrite or verification, now costs me $2.95 to read.
July 18th, 2006 at 3:12 pm
Meh … Google cache makes the problem go away.
July 18th, 2006 at 7:16 pm
One thing, tho, about the Observer is that its website could use a little work. Its plain.
July 18th, 2006 at 8:33 pm
What’s funny is that if they charged 50 cents for an archived article they may actually sell one or two.
July 19th, 2006 at 3:55 pm
There is a work-around, which I won’t list here, lest they close it off. However, LissaKay’s response works too.
The Observer’s earlier archives weren’t searchable, but the newer ones — after mid-February, I think, ARE searchable (per issue) through Acrobat Reader, and Google picks them up as well.
If the Observer wanted to charge to give me online access to the current edition (as well as archives), I’d gladly forego the dead-tree edition in order to be able to read it online a few hours earlier… and not have to recycle the papers. I’ve actually talked to the publisher about this, and if he can figure out how to make a go of it, he may do so.
July 19th, 2006 at 7:38 pm
Sure, as a person who gets a lot of his entertainment from workarounds, I find em before I bitch, however, in this case its the principal of the thing.
This whole thing has really got me liking the Observer. I’ve been liking em more and more, and last weeks posting of the campaign contributions, as well as the transcripts from the League of Women Voters deal is helping.
July 19th, 2006 at 7:47 pm
While we do link to an outside vendor, Newsbank, on our site (and provide our artciles to at least one other archive vendor), you can use the site search on the front of the Web site and get most articles that we had online in the past TWO MONTHS (as opposed to the one week claim) for free. Columns, such as those of Sam Venable or Tom Humphrey or Ina Hughs or any of the others, are online for one year.
I say most becuase articles posted to the pay subscription site, GoVolsXtra, will come up, but you would need to be a GVX subscriber to access them.
the Newbank archive is good. It goes back to September 1990 — that’s a lot of data. And a bonus budget tip: If you are a Knox County Public Library Card holder, you can access the Newsbank archives for free through its site!
As for the “now charging” bit. When we began that is sooooo long ago, it’s beyond what I can remember. Certainly more than five or six years.
– jack lail
managing editor/multi-media
Knoxville News Sentinel
July 19th, 2006 at 8:17 pm
Mr. Lail,
Thanks for the clarification on the amount of time News-Sentinel articles are available through the traditional site search. Two months is certainly a bit more reasonable than one week.
Thanks also for the tip about the Library Card - is that information available on the knoxnews site?
And as for the “now charging” bit, I never claimed to know when that began. It only became apparent to me yesterday, and seemed to surprise a few other people. In other words, it’s news to us.