Fixed that for you, Salon
Let me state up front that I love ads. Well not so much ads as what ads do for me. To wit: Advertising allows me to get shit for free.
I’m aware of the economic arguments that time spent watching ads is unproductive time, and therefore not, in fact, free, but if I’m already watching a television show that I enjoy, I’m not working. Would I spend eight minutes saved during a half hour sitcom developing a product or providing a service? I’m watching a sitcom, for crying out loud. My industriousness is already highly suspect. The same applies, I would argue, to Internet advertising. Ads can be annoying, but what’s the alternative? NYT-style paywalls? Pay-per-read? During the crest and early fall of the dotcom bubble, the concept of micropayments was really starting to pick up steam, and visions of hundreds of $1.00 charges danced in our heads. It frankly struck fear in my heart. Fortunately I didn’t need to worry; there’s a great article by Clay Shirky from December 2000 making the case against the micropayment system, and it sums things up nicely:
The Short Answer for Why Micropayments Fail
Users hate them.
The Long Answer for Why Micropayments Fail
Why does it matter that users hate micropayments? Because users are the ones with the money, and micropayments do not take user preferences into account.
In particular, users want predictable and simple pricing. Micropayments, meanwhile, waste the users’ mental effort in order to conserve cheap resources, by creating many tiny, unpredictable transactions. Micropayments thus create in the mind of the user both anxiety and confusion, characteristics that users have not heretofore been known to actively seek out.
Certain micropayment systems, of course, have been wildly successful - iTunes, for one - but they’re pretty much the exceptions. Membership-driven models also work - even the widely reviled TimesSelect appears to be fairly healthy - but it usually takes some superlative content to make people fork over their cash. A google search for “dropping HBO” reveals an exodus after last nights’ Sopranos finale, and given that HBO’s broadcast business model begins and ends with subscriptions*, this is pretty damn critical.
But advertising is still where it’s at, for radio, TV, and the internet, and I say fine. Given the choice between good** content for free, good content with a pipeline directly to my wallet, or no content, I’m going to choose column A.
Then again.
I have read Salon for years. They’ve tried several funding options, including memberships and paywalls. I can’t remember if they ever did micropayments, but I wouldn’t be surprised. I wonder how Camille Paglia would have done under that system. Anyway, I’ve actually been quite happy with the Adwall system they have now - it’s annoying, no doubt, but a thirty second clickthrough for all that content is far from onerous. I’ve considered joining over the years, of course, and probably should have - but, as implied, GODDAMN do I hate paying in order to read or watch things. So I was overjoyed when I read that I had an opportunity for a free yearly membership. I mean, obviously I knew it wouldn’t be free; but who knows? Maybe I just have to pre-order Harry Potter, or something else I was planning to do anyway. So I clicked through, and was horrified.
It’s not like Salon has never run ads for credit cards; in fact, Visa has been a long-term sponsor. Hell, just writing this post will cause a bunch of credit card ads to pop up in the Google Ads. But this is something new. Salon is offering a free membership for anyone who qualifies for an American Express Blue card. Not just applies - qualifies.
This goes well beyond advertising, obviously. With advertising, as our lovely hostess*** rightly points out, editorial and advertising are separate. The contract between the content provider, advertiser, and content consumer ends at the display of ads. Sure, there’s all kinds of clickthrough or sales agreements, but those are between the provider at advertiser alone. With this promotion, Salon is offering a much more thoroughly entwined quid pro quo; there is no more wall. If we buy, Salon will do.
And even that wouldn’t be completely objectionable. After all, I was ready to order Harry Potter on Salon’s say-so. But credit cards? Has Salon seen the stories about where credit card debt is taking this country and the people in it? Hell, they’ve written the stories about where credit card debt is taking us. And yet they’re offering us not only credit card advertisments, but literally asking us to change our credit profile just to support them. In fact, the lead of the advertisement talks about the benefits of Salon membership:
NO ADS - GO STRAIGHT TO ARTICLES - FREE BOOKS, MAGAZINES - CONTRIBUTE TO THE PRECARIOUSNESS OF THE AMERICAN ECONOMY
I may have slipped that last one in there. But it’s what they’re asking you to do. Now, I know that credit cards are a personal choice; I know that, given judicious use, they can be very helpful to people; I know that we value caveat emptor in this country and all that. But the same is true of MDMA. I have the feeling that if Salon said “Free memberships to anyone who asks for and receives a prescription for ecstasy” there’d probably be a few complaints****.
Salon’s no longer simply allowing credit card companies to sell their wares on their site. Salon is now selling credit cards. This is a left-leaning web site, and they’re hawking consumer debt with “60 second decisions.” What’s next? “Free membership with the purchase of 10 pounds of veal?” “Sponsor an abortion clinic bomber?” “Subscribe to this website and we’ll shoot this dog?”
——————
* This doesn’t take into account DVD sales, but then again, the networks have a share of that market.
** I’m speaking relatively, here.
*** See how lame it sounds, Dana?
**** No, I know that MDMA isn’t really being prescribed for anything, although many doctors want it to be; the analogy works for many other substances of abuse.
22 Responses to “Like Salon? Well, you’ll love bankruptcy court!”
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I always hate when people miss the entire point of a long post I make, and say, “today I ate oatmeal,” but I am about to do it to you. You are funny, man. I always like seeing your name on here.
And, um, I agree with this post.
I think it is rather silly to say that displaying ads is just business, but partnering with ad providers is somehow far more insidious.
This goes well beyond advertising, obviously. With advertising, as our lovely hostess*** rightly points out, editorial and advertising are separate.
I don’t see any editorial in the AmEx ad.
Once you decide to accept any and all ads you’ve lost most of your right to complain. Someone truly concerned about the plight of American debt would not run CC ads in any form.
I’m sure they justify it in the exact same way that you do - bills have to be paid. Salon does not have ads strewn everywhere, which means the ads they do have need to have a higher rate of return, both for Salon and for the advertiser.
This feels like saying “Marry me and you’ll get into this website free!” I may not be against marriage, but I’d rather not make that committment just to get into a website.
You mean, Auguste, you’re not going to your local independent bookstore for the midnight sales party?
I mean, COME ON. You call yourself a Potter fan.
Oh jeez, Salon. I had to stop reading the site because my browser removes their ads. I got over it.
Bizarro,
First of all, I disagree with your definition of “editorial.” By asking people to support Salon directly, Salon has written a de facto editorial urging AmEx membership.
I don’t disagree, necessarily. But I disagree at where the line is drawn. Passive and active advertising are two different things. Pandagon may allow a Rudy ‘08 ad to continue running, despite the fact that he’s a dangerous fascist piece of shit. But we’re not likely to run a promotion offering free Pandagon memberships* in exchange for voting for Rudy, or donating to his campaign fund.
* Oh, you didn’t know about those? I thought all the highly valued commenters got that e-ma…ohhhhhh, wait. Sorry. Forget I said anything.
Let me state up front that I love ads.
I don’t, and will pay a lot to avoid them. To each his own!
Tlönista, I have the same problem. And I used to have a yearly subscription. But at some point I found their coverage had become too “fluffy” (probably 2-3 years ago) and I let my subscription lapse, but I’d still do the “day pass” fairly often. And then their “day pass” system became incompatible with my browser, and I almost never read them anymore.
Way to lose a reliable $50/year Salon!
Yeah, Firefox removes the ads, so I can’t click through. A little birdie told me that there are scripts you can run that allow you to get access to Salon without clicking the ad (Google is your friend), if you don’t have qualms about that sort of thing, which I don’t, since I’d be perfectly willing to click the ad if I could see it.
Ha! Yeah, been wondering what’s up with that.
free Pandagon memberships*
It’s a marketing scam. Don’t do it. Amanda has my social security number and is opening charge accounts left and right and all I have to show for it is a garage full of baby-doll t-shirts with the old pandagon logo on them.
“…all I have to show for it is a garage full of baby-doll t-shirts with the old pandagon logo on them.”
If you keep them long enough, they might become collectible…
:)
At the risk of being all “I like oatmeal” It seems like credit card offers are everywhere these days, and pop up in all kinds of ways.
I’m the target demographic for credit card companies: I’m a grad student, and I usually carry a balance and then pay it off over time. As a result, I receive countless credit card offers every day in the mail.
I saw that link on Salon and was mighty peeved. Then, to make matters worse, I go to my mailbox today and I have a piece of mail from my union. Hmm..what is this I wonder. ..I open it up, and what do I see, but another frickin’ credit card offer!!! From my UNION! Shouldn’t they be protecting us from this shite?
Working Assets is similar. It is connected to the Working for Change organization, and I understand that using these cards will help progressive causes, but damn, credit card debt is bad enough. Credit cards will not help long-term progressive causes, unless they cause a new Depression, and we can go all Roosevelt on them.
so I tried to donate to P’gon a while back with my credit card and it just seized up about halfway into the transaction. THAT wasn’t going to be a micropayment and it was forstall ads…I only want Ann Coulter and nutty bible sellers to pay for P’gon.
Pandagon doesn’t have the overhead that Salon has [How many T-shirs Kyso K?]
Well, yes, I agree with your main point. I don’t find it surprising, though; getting a premium for signing up for a credit card is hardly new. If Salon were a print mag with this insert in it, would you pay attention? Should we hold Salon to a higher standard than the New Yorker or Harpers?
Speaking of changed focus…
I was a longtime subscriber to Wired magazine. Loved it, read each issue cover to cover.
Got it ‘free’ for joining Salon. Heard the editor died. Now it’s like reading a mashup of Rolling Stone and some macho shopping magazine…
Not impressed…
Also get ‘Reason’ for re-uping. It’s a liberitarian mag. Huh? Left leaning? I’m not so sure…
I like oatmeal.
For those who can’t get through the Salon ad page: I have most of the ads blocked via /etc/hosts (redirect the ad servers to 127.0.0.1), but I can still get into Salon these days. Most of their ads (even the Flash ones) will display a “Enter Salon” link on the upper right corner after about 10 seconds of waiting.
Only at places that aren’t run primarily for profit is advertising truly separated from editorial. Otherwise, if your ad revenue isn’t sufficing, , you have to think what you’re going to do with your editorial to make it better at delivering readers’ eyes to your paymasters. (I wonder, though, whether Salon’s readers are a good bet for a credit card company. They might well be the kind who pay their bills on time and cancel cards they don’t need, aka ‘deadbeats’.)
(I also think Clay Shirky was wrong about micropayments, because by the time he was writing, in the US at least, the credit-card monopoly had pretty much guaranteed that no payment of less than a buck or so would make economic sense to the payee. Advertising is essentially third-party micropayments of fractions of a penny at a time, and works just fine. But that’s all water under the bridge.)
But would you maybe trade a TotalFark membership for a date?
(actually, I bet that has been tried on Fark a million times)
Salon morphing into a bi’niss model and mentality?
Probably some fuc*king suit with an MBA from Harvard infiltrated.
Or a stealth from the Chamber of Commerce.
Or is it all inevitable, a system thing, that when you get good and
are achieving success, that commerce and profit —inevitably?– come along
both to ‘bolster’ AND soil the enterprise.
Guess I’ll slip on over to ‘How the World Works’ and ask Andrew Leonard.
[I read and participate in both Pandagon (donate to) and Salon (subscribe)
on a very modest discretionary. I’d really miss either, a lot.
And it IS important they retain what is …essence]
I hate to point out the obvious, but applying for and qualifying are two different things. Before you go, “well, duh, obviously,” it is important. Actually qualifying for the card means (to the credit card companies at least, though it may have little to no basis in reality) that you can afford it, you have the money for it.
It makes sense. How many upper-middle class “mommy” stories have there been on Salon lately? Salon is targeting those people as a demographic. Even though it is easier to get money out of poor people, they are going for the people with money to spend. It’s part of some insane belief that the upper-middle class and upper class are the only ones who matter, the only people worth knowing.
BTW, I Loooooove Oatmeal!