In other words, if you didn’t go to OSU, and you live, say, in Alaska, then you’ll have to pay to read articles in the Daily O’Collegian about the goings on at the Stillwater campus.

That silence you hear is the number of people affected.

We’ve been pretty agnostic at Epicenter about newspaper paywalls. We think that strapped publishers have every right to try to charge their customers directly. We have applauded the New York Times for stepping up to the plate to prove or disprove the concept with the gravitas few newspapers have.

But there is a bit of a disconnect in the notion that you will make money by barricading people out who aren’t trying to get in. It’s like taxing a vegan every time he has a cheeseburger.

Ray Catalino, the Daily O’Collegian’s circulation honcho, saw it differently in an interview with the Cleveland Leader:

“We’ve always known that the content our students produce has value well beyond the free drop distribution of our newspaper. Charging a modest fee to access our online content for non-students who live outside Stillwater helps us foster that belief.”

In fairness, the initiative does seem to clearly illustrate the point paywall critics have been making in the abstract. It’s also true that O’Collegian isn’t going all Times of London, by allowing the first three accesses free. It should be noted that OSU has an enormous commitment to social media and there is no word that KOSU intends to sample your IP or e-mail address before you can stream its audio. On your smartphone, no less.

So it sure does feel like someone has been sold a bill of goods that he has goods to sell.

We’ve written to the Daily O’Collegian’s editor-in-chief, and hope to hear from him soon.

Hat tip to MediaBistro, WebNewser and the Cleveland Leader, and with apologies to Zen Buddhism.

Follow us for disruptive tech news: John C. Abell and Epicenter on Twitter.

See Also:

• New York Times Considers $5 Monthly Web Fee: Bloomberg
• New York Times Plans to Charge for Articles
• Wall Street Journal Takes Paywall Fight to Mobiles
• NY Times’ Sulzberger Explains Philosophy Behind Charging for Articles
• Placating Publishers by Limiting Links: A Google 5-Click FAQ
• Wall Street Journal iPhone App Sets Content Free
• Murdoch To Google: I Must Block You (Wait For It …)
• Print War Between NYT and WSJ Is Really About Digital

Authors: John C Abell

to know more click here