Sunday, October 19, 2014

S.F. Chronicle Does The Freddy Wrong

I suppose it was inevitable. The San Francisco Chronicle seems to be working its way into a pay site. One of my favorite weekly columnists, Willie Brown, seems to be behind a paywall now. I checked a couple other stories and there doesn't seem to be a paywall on them. Maybe it's just a glitch?

Probably not. Maybe just the more viewed pages to start and the rest to follow. Looks like it might be $10.00 a month for a subscription. I can't find anything about rates for online only. Too expensive for me, regardless. I'm bummed.

9 Comments:

At 9:14 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Ya just can't get sumthin for nuthin anymo'.

 
At 9:18 AM, Blogger Fred Mangels said...

Yep. I don't mind paying, but I can't pay for every paper I want to read. Right now I have subscriptions to the Santa Rosa Press- Democrat and Sacramento Bee. Oh, and the Times- Standard for the hard copy.

Subscriptions generally run $9.00 a month and up. I can't really afford any more. Sad thing about the Chronicle is I don't read much in that paper. Maybe one article a day on average, but I always enjoy Willie Brown's column on Sundays.

 
At 9:49 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I don't like the new format of their website and don't go anymore, sad. I know things change, they don't even print their formerly amazing food section, but darn it I hate it!

 
At 9:57 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

You can get home delivery on the Chronicle in Eureka and other Northcoast cities. Also, most of the area libraries get copies. But that said, the Chronicle is a shadow of what it used to be when, it the words of Herb Caen, it "had more columns than a Greek temple."

 
At 9:59 AM, Blogger Fred Mangels said...

I've notice the main papers I read I've changed formats fairly recently. I don't mind the Chronicle change as it doesn't seem to freak out my computer as much as their old format.

The L.A. Times changed theirs a few weeks ago, maybe longer, but theirs is more along the lines of the Time magazine format now. I hate that. What were they thinking?

The Sacramento Bee seems to be changing theirs over the last few days. Today was the first time I noticed a real difference, but I stopped receiving their daily news summary a few days ago for some reason. The Bee's change isn't bad but I saw nothing wrong with their old page.

If it ain't broke, why try and fix it? I can't help wonder if this isn't a case of these papers playing monkey see, monkey do?

 
At 10:02 AM, Blogger Fred Mangels said...

"...the Chronicle is a shadow of what it used to be..."

Most papers are having trouble and cutting back since everything is going online. It will be interesting to see how things play out. It doesn't seem so good so far, as far as I'm concerned.

 
At 10:48 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Site is working for me. No paywalls. Complete access to all non-special feature articles...

 
At 11:22 AM, Blogger Fred Mangels said...

Maybe Willie Brown's column is now a "special" feature. Site works fine for me, too. Other stories work fine. His column says I have to log in, or open an account to read the whole thing.

 
At 12:26 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

www.sfgate.com is still free but they opened another website several months ago which is a pay site.

 

Post a Comment

<< Home