Freeing up paid content
Are you still steamed because The New York Times has insisted you pony up $50 a year to read your favorite opinion columnists online? You say you’d sooner never again read another word from Paul Krugman or Frank Rich than – everybody spit the words together now – pay for online content?
Don’t look for any sympathy here. Not only do I believe the Times is doing the right thing, I’m all in favor of paid online content, period. The more the merrier. (If you really can’t understand why, I’ll show you my résumé, which reveals no discernible skills other than the one I’m exercising at the moment. Then I’ll show you a picture of my kids.)
But fret not, my freebie-addicted friends, as there are those more attuned to your plight and they appear willing to help.
Coming soon to a Web browser near you is a new search engine called Congoo that promises to provide regular users with once-again-free access to a selection of otherwise pay-to-peek content – albeit on a limited basis and with a few strings attached.
According to co-founder and CEO Ash Nashed, the site – www.congoo.com – will launch in beta form within a few weeks. Here’s how it will work:
Congoo is in the process of contracting with various publishers and providers of paid online content – newspapers, magazines, trade journals, financial services, even games and music download sites. The providers are agreeing to grant access to their paid content to Congoo users, with limitations set either on the number of free looks or duration of the access.
Users will enter search terms on Congoo as they would any other search engine, and the returned links would be presented in two groups: paid sites accessible by Congoo users free of charge, and general search results. Site users must register and accumulate points for each search they conduct, with those points being redeemable for access to paid content.
The points business might prove to be a turn-off, but Nashed is convinced that most will find it a small price to pay to avoid having to pay.
“We help the consumer access content that they wouldn’t otherwise be able to access,” says Nashed, who founded Choice Media in 1999 and sold it to a group of investors earlier this year. “So to the degree that we can help with that, we think we do make [paid content] a less bitter pill to swallow.”
Nashed says the response from paid-content providers has been extremely encouraging, although he declined to name any that have already signed on (so don’t get the impression that The New York Times is necessarily among them). Publishers of print products, in particular, are interested in the concept, he says, both as a mechanism for offering free samples in the hope that online samplers will become online buyers, and as a means of protecting their print franchises from additional reader erosion.
“Certainly people realize that there is an inevitable threat to that base regardless of what they do,” Nashed says. “But to the degree that the content is freely and easily available online, it certainly doesn’t help that situation. That print subscription base and print advertising is 95% of most of these companies’ revenue.”
Congoo is providing proprietary technology to manage user access to the premium content, and turning to a search engine company Nashed wouldn’t name for that end of the operation.
“Ultimately, I don’t think people are going to use an inferior search engine in order to get access to premium content,” he says. “It’s got to be at least as good as what they get elsewhere. We believe ours will not only be at least as good but also offer some additional features.
“We’ve got a significant marketing budget allotted, but the real focus here is going to be on word of mouth. And our publishing partners are also going to kick in, we believe, in terms of sending people to the site,” he says.
People will come, all right. Question is whether they’ll come back often enough for Congoo to make a go of it.
This column is always free, and your two cents is always welcome. The address is buzz@nww.com.
