The New York Times has announced it’s cutting the character limit on site comments from 5,000 to 2,000. In Twitter terms that’s like going from 36 tweets to slightly more than 14 — a 60% drop.
According to a note on the site’s homepage Monday, “The shorter length will allow for an improved experience for commenters and readers alike.”
The statement is good news for readers who roll their eyes when commenters hog the soapbox. But for Internet users who view commenting as an opportunity to see reactions that would have otherwise been limited to personal letter or email, it’s a step in the wrong direction. Though 14 tweets’ worth of discussion is still a fair amount, the change opens the door for further character cutting in the future.
The new limit was inspired by feedback from readers and Times employees, Aron Pilhofer, editor of interactive news, told The Wrap.
“5,000 [characters] is a lot,” Pilhofer said. “That’s not a comment, that’s an article.”
The shorter character limit will change community behavior. Readers who are used to writing essay-length comments may become more blunt as they aim to get to their point faster. Or they may work around the limit by breaking thoughts into multiple comments. Still, the shorter length will help Times moderators get through comments more quickly, allowing them to quell inappropriate threads with greater speed.
In late May the BBC dropped its limit to 400 characters — 20 characters less than is allowed for a Facebook status update.
The BBC’s character cut inspired Martin Belam, lead user experience and information architect at The Guardian, to survey the comment character counts of a range of U.S. and UK news media sites. Here’s a sample of his findings, updated to include The New York Times‘ recent change:
| Website, | Comment Character Count |
| BBC News | 400 |
| Facebook (status update) | 420 |
| YouTube | 500 |
| Daily Mail | 1,000 |
| The Huffington Post | 1,800* |
| The New York Times | 2,000 |
| The Sun | 2,000 |
| The Washington Post | 3,000 |
| The Times (U.K.) | 3,000 | The Guardian | 5,000 |
| Facebook (comment) | 8,000 |
| CNN | 10,000 |
| Al Jazeera | 10,000 |
| The Telegraph | 10,000 |
*The actual limit imposed on Huffington Post is 250 words, which equates to 1,820 characters.
What do you think of The Times‘ comment character cut? Will it truly make for a more inviting commenting space or is the site infringing on commenters’ rights? Sound off in the thread below — we won’t cut you off.
Mashable’s comment character limit: 16,384
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Pundits applauded when The New York Times announced last week that managing editor Jill Abramson will succeed Bill Keller as executive editor of the paper this September, not only because of her sold investigative background and the fact that she will become the paper’s first female editor, but also because she is seen as a competent leader in the digital space.
This is a bit ironic, given that Abramson was not active on Twitter at the time of her appointment. We can now report that her first tweet appeared Thursday, and she’s sent five tweets since then — including an amusing correction to Felix Salmon of Reuters.
Welcome to the party, Ms. Abramson.
[via jill abramson, media, new york times, twitter
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The Huffington Post has surpassed The New York Times in monthly uniques from the U.S., according to data from comScore and illustrated in a chart by Business Insider above.
In May, The Huffington Post pulled in 36.6 million unique visitors from the U.S., compared to 35.5 for The New York Times.
Before you new media cheerleaders get too excited, note that AOLNews.com began redirecting to huffingtonpost.com at the beginning of May. We’ll have to wait to see how long the boost lasts — and whether the NYT can do anything to strike back against its upstart rival.
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Managing editor Jill Abramson will become the first female executive editor of The New York Times beginning September 6, replacing current executive editor Bill Keller.
Abramson has operated as managing editor of the Times since 2003. She served as Washington bureau chief for the paper from 2000 to 2003, having left a nine-year stint as deputy bureau chief and investigative reporter for The Wall Street Journal.
Last year, Abramson temporarily stepped away from her duties as managing editor to run the Times‘s online operations, a move she initiated to experience the integration of the paper’s print and digital staffs, she said in an interview with the Times published Thursday.
Keller, whose tirades against social media have proved popular fodder for online media as of late, will continue at the paper as a full-time writer and Sunday opinions columnist. He served as executive editor for eight years.
Arthur Sulzberger, Jr., publisher and the chairman of The New York Times Company, said that the decision to step down was entirely Keller’s and that he accepted his resignation “with mixed emotions.”
Meanwhile, current Washington bureau chief and former Los Angeles Times editor Dean Baquet will assume the role of managing editor.
Image courtesy of The New York Times
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The research and development department of The New York Times has recently been pondering the life cycle of the paper’s news stories in social media — specifically, on Twitter. Cascade is a project that visually represents what happens when readers tweet about articles.
Even now, however, Cascade is more than just a nifty data visualization. Some journalists think it also gives us new ways of to think about and optimize for sharing and engagement on the social web, especially since it helps identify the most influential sharers, the more shareable terms, and more.
Its creators write on the project’s website that Cascade “links browsing behavior on a site to sharing activity to construct a detailed picture of how information propagates through the social media space. While initially applied to New York Times stories and information, the tool and its underlying logic may be applied to any publisher or brand interested in understanding how its messages are shared.”
Here’s what a cascade for a typical article looks like:
For the developers among our readers, Cascade was created using Processing and MongoDB.
What do you think of Cascade?
More About: new york times, nyt, social media, twitter
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The New York Times has sold more than 100,000 digital subscriptions in the three weeks since its launch, the publication revealed in its first-quarter earnings statement Thursday morning.
Given the relatively modest expectations the Times set for the paywall, the number isn’t bad.
At launch, the Times offered readers a four-week trial for 99 cents — a substantial discount from the $15 to $35 subscribers will have to fork over in subsequent four-week periods. If the Times can manage to keep all 100,000 subscribers for a full year, it stands to pocket an extra $20 million in revenue for 2011.
It’s still not clear what kind of long-term effect the paywall will have on traffic and how advertising revenues will be affected, however.
Operating profit was down 41% to $31.1 million year-over-year. Total revenues decreased 3.6% to $566.5 million from $587.9 million. Digital advertising grew 4.5%, compensating somewhat for the 3.7% decline in circulation and 7.5% decline in print advertising revenue. Digital products now make up 28% of the Times‘s total advertising revenues, the company said.
More About: new york times, paywall
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Welcome to this morning’s edition of “First To Know,” a series in which we keep you in the know on what’s happening in the digital world. We’re keeping our eyes on five particular stories of interest today.
Amazon Server Trouble Takes Down Reddit, Foursquare & HootSuite
Some of Amazon’s AWS services are experiencing technical difficulties, causing downtime and latency issues with big social media sites such as HootSuite, Reddit and Foursquare.
President Obama Visits Facebook
President Barack Obama discussed the economy, technology, innovation and more during a packed town hall at Facebook headquarters Wednesday.
Apple Reports Record Earnings
Apple released its fiscal second quarter results Wednesday afternoon, reporting earnings of $6.40 per share on $24.67 billion revenue. iPad 2 demand has been particularly staggering, the company said.
NYT Sells 100,000 Digital Subscriptions
The New York Times has sold more than 100,000 digital subscriptions in the three weeks since its launch, the publication announced in its first quarter earnings report this morning.
Mashable Follow Now Open To All
Mashable Follow, a new social layer at Mashable that lets users follow the topics and people that interest them, officially launched Wednesday.
Further News
Image courtesy of iStockphoto, DNY59
More About: amazon, apple, facebook, first to know series, new york times
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Welcome to this morning’s edition of “First To Know,” a series in which we keep you in the know on what’s happening in the digital world. We’re keeping our eyes on five particular stories of interest today.
Amazon Server Trouble Takes Down Reddit, Foursquare & HootSuite
Some of Amazon’s AWS services are experiencing technical difficulties, causing downtime and latency issues with big social media sites such as HootSuite, Reddit and Foursquare.
President Obama Visits Facebook
President Barack Obama discussed the economy, technology, innovation and more during a packed town hall at Facebook headquarters Wednesday.
Apple Reports Record Earnings
Apple released its fiscal second quarter results Wednesday afternoon, reporting earnings of $6.40 per share on $24.67 billion revenue. iPad 2 demand has been particularly staggering, the company said.
NYT Sells 100,000 Digital Subscriptions
The New York Times has sold more than 100,000 digital subscriptions in the three weeks since its launch, the publication announced in its first quarter earnings report this morning.
Mashable Follow Now Open To All
Mashable Follow, a new social layer at Mashable that lets users follow the topics and people that interest them, officially launched Wednesday.
Further News
Image courtesy of iStockphoto, DNY59
More About: amazon, apple, facebook, first to know series, new york times
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The recent launch of The New York Times paywall has prompted debates about the viability and fairness of paying for news online. Are publications unrealistic about subscription prices? Should the community rally to support journalism? Is it worth paying for?
But the biggest question that lingers in an everyday web reader’s mind is much simpler: “Will clicking on this link bring me to a story?”
Accessing news articles from social media, blogs and other sites has become increasingly common, making an unexpected paywall an unpleasant reader experience. Maintaining the happiness of subscribers and non-subscribers alike has fallen on the shoulders of community managers at these paywalled sites.
“Social media editors may suddenly find they can’t share their paper’s best content via Twitter without reader backlash,” says Chris Snider, a multimedia journalism instructor at Drake University. “So they will have to act more like marketers than journalists, and sell people on why they should pay for that content.”
The social media efforts of these sites differ greatly depending on what access is permitted by the paywall. Here’s a look at digital subscription models of three different publications, and how each affects its community building strategy.
Dallas’ major newspaper has only seen the beginnings of its paywall’s effect on social media strategy, as the site began charging for digital access a month ago. The model allows non-subscribers to see early breaking news and blog posts, while more evergreen features and investigative pieces must be paid for.
Travis Hudson, a Dallas Morning News web editor, manages the site’s Twitter account and Facebook fan page, where he shares both free and premium content. Like any good social media strategist, transparency is key for Hudson. He designates whether a link is behind the paywall when posting it on Facebook or Twitter.
“When a premium story slips by on a social network without the premium labeling, we hear about it quickly from people irate about clicking a link and being unable to read beyond 50 words,” Hudson says.
The site’s community growth is no longer seeing the moderate upward trend it had before the premium content initiative, he adds. @dallas_news now ranks ninth in follower count of U.S. newspapers on Twitter, according to The Wrap. The site’s Facebook fan page is ranked 57th among U.S. newspapers in terms of Likes, says Snider, who tracks the Facebook growth of newspapers.
Still, Hudson says the change hasn’t been as severe as he was expecting. “It’s a struggle when I’m unable to utilize some of our best content to build and drive traffic to the masses,” he says. “But I think it can be compensated by the variety of content available for free, like our visuals, blogs, breaking news coverage and more.”
Unlike The New York Times and Dallas Morning News, international affairs magazine The Economist made changes to its paywall that increased the range of articles non-paying visitors may view. Previous pay barriers prevented visitors from accessing articles either from the latest edition, or from editions that were more than a few months old. Now readers can see a fixed number of articles across the site each week before having to subscribe. The paywall only applies to articles printed in the weekly magazine, while web-only content — such as blogs, multimedia and interactive features — remains free.
The change has been a positive one for many visitors, says Mark Johnson, The Economist‘s community editor. The community has grown on the site itself through comments and reader-focused features, such as polls, debates and live discussions. Social media helps the site reach subscribers, regular readers and new readers by the means most convenient to them, while providing an opportunity to spark discussions around The Economist‘s coverage areas.
“Readers who are empowered to participate are likely to spend more time with the site, return more often and become more active advocates of our work,” Johnson says.
With the metered model, Johnson and other web producers can share any articles on social networks without experiencing the backlash of readers’ inability to access the site. Perhaps more importantly, they’re able to bring in more traffic.
“Referrals to the site from social networks, and the pageviews generated by such referrals, have grown almost every month since our social strategy began,” Johnson says. “Nor is this growth slowing. If anything, it’s speeding up.”
Online-only local news site the Honolulu Civil Beat is coming up on the one-year anniversary of its launch. Though content is and always has been free through email, the site initially gave only partial access to visitors who came through social networks. Beginning January 2011, however, all visitors can read all articles until they visit regularly enough to be asked to become a member.
“We figured, if they’re reading us that much they would be happy to become a member, and we’d be happy to have them,” says Dan Zelikman, the Civil Beat‘s marketing and community host.
There is no specific threshold number. Rather, the site runs a custom program that asks a reader to subscribe based on how often and how much he or she reads. “Basically, if you read a couple of times a week, it will take a while before we ask you to register,” Zelikman says.
Reading access aside, the Civil Beat‘s subscription model fosters community by only allowing members to comment on articles. In addition, subscribers experience the site without advertising, a perk that’s particularly popular with the community. “They feel that we are here to serve them 100% — and they also like the banner-free site experience.”
Zelikman uses Twitter and Facebook to engage readers by accepting reader content submissions, livestreaming events and facilitating discussion.
“Social media gives us instant feedback on what resonates with our readers,” Zelikman says. “We are very happy with the warm welcome we received in our community. Since launch, new readers keep coming to the site.”
With community stewardship as a central tenet of journalism, any news site that has a paywall — or is considering one — should keep the social reading experience at the forefront of its strategy. The frustration of clicking a link that leads to inaccessible content will turn readers away, often leaving them with harsh feelings toward the site. Gradually assimilating readers to a site’s breadth of content will foster loyalty, and, in turn, build a stronger community.
Interested in more Journalism resources? Check out Mashable Explore, a new way to discover information on your favorite Mashable topics.Image courtesy of iStockphoto, narvikk
More About: dallas morning news, digital publishing, honolulu civil beat, journalism, media, new york times, News, newspaper, paywall, social media, The Economist
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The recent launch of The New York Times paywall has prompted debates about the viability and fairness of paying for news online. Are publications unrealistic about subscription prices? Should the community rally to support journalism? Is it worth paying for?
But the biggest question that lingers in an everyday web reader’s mind is much simpler: “Will clicking on this link bring me to a story?”
Accessing news articles from social media, blogs and other sites has become increasingly common, making an unexpected paywall an unpleasant reader experience. Maintaining the happiness of subscribers and non-subscribers alike has fallen on the shoulders of community managers at these paywalled sites.
“Social media editors may suddenly find they can’t share their paper’s best content via Twitter without reader backlash,” says Chris Snider, a multimedia journalism instructor at Drake University. “So they will have to act more like marketers than journalists, and sell people on why they should pay for that content.”
The social media efforts of these sites differ greatly depending on what access is permitted by the paywall. Here’s a look at digital subscription models of three different publications, and how each affects its community building strategy.
Dallas’ major newspaper has only seen the beginnings of its paywall’s effect on social media strategy, as the site began charging for digital access a month ago. The model allows non-subscribers to see early breaking news and blog posts, while more evergreen features and investigative pieces must be paid for.
Travis Hudson, a Dallas Morning News web editor, manages the site’s Twitter account and Facebook fan page, where he shares both free and premium content. Like any good social media strategist, transparency is key for Hudson. He designates whether a link is behind the paywall when posting it on Facebook or Twitter.
“When a premium story slips by on a social network without the premium labeling, we hear about it quickly from people irate about clicking a link and being unable to read beyond 50 words,” Hudson says.
The site’s community growth is no longer seeing the moderate upward trend it had before the premium content initiative, he adds. @dallas_news now ranks ninth in follower count of U.S. newspapers on Twitter, according to The Wrap. The site’s Facebook fan page is ranked 57th among U.S. newspapers in terms of Likes, says Snider, who tracks the Facebook growth of newspapers.
Still, Hudson says the change hasn’t been as severe as he was expecting. “It’s a struggle when I’m unable to utilize some of our best content to build and drive traffic to the masses,” he says. “But I think it can be compensated by the variety of content available for free, like our visuals, blogs, breaking news coverage and more.”
Unlike The New York Times and Dallas Morning News, international affairs magazine The Economist made changes to its paywall that increased the range of articles non-paying visitors may view. Previous pay barriers prevented visitors from accessing articles either from the latest edition, or from editions that were more than a few months old. Now readers can see a fixed number of articles across the site each week before having to subscribe. The paywall only applies to articles printed in the weekly magazine, while web-only content — such as blogs, multimedia and interactive features — remains free.
The change has been a positive one for many visitors, says Mark Johnson, The Economist‘s community editor. The community has grown on the site itself through comments and reader-focused features, such as polls, debates and live discussions. Social media helps the site reach subscribers, regular readers and new readers by the means most convenient to them, while providing an opportunity to spark discussions around The Economist‘s coverage areas.
“Readers who are empowered to participate are likely to spend more time with the site, return more often and become more active advocates of our work,” Johnson says.
With the metered model, Johnson and other web producers can share any articles on social networks without experiencing the backlash of readers’ inability to access the site. Perhaps more importantly, they’re able to bring in more traffic.
“Referrals to the site from social networks, and the pageviews generated by such referrals, have grown almost every month since our social strategy began,” Johnson says. “Nor is this growth slowing. If anything, it’s speeding up.”
Online-only local news site the Honolulu Civil Beat is coming up on the one-year anniversary of its launch. Though content is and always has been free through email, the site initially gave only partial access to visitors who came through social networks. Beginning January 2011, however, all visitors can read all articles until they visit regularly enough to be asked to become a member.
“We figured, if they’re reading us that much they would be happy to become a member, and we’d be happy to have them,” says Dan Zelikman, the Civil Beat‘s marketing and community host.
There is no specific threshold number. Rather, the site runs a custom program that asks a reader to subscribe based on how often and how much he or she reads. “Basically, if you read a couple of times a week, it will take a while before we ask you to register,” Zelikman says.
Reading access aside, the Civil Beat‘s subscription model fosters community by only allowing members to comment on articles. In addition, subscribers experience the site without advertising, a perk that’s particularly popular with the community. “They feel that we are here to serve them 100% — and they also like the banner-free site experience.”
Zelikman uses Twitter and Facebook to engage readers by accepting reader content submissions, livestreaming events and facilitating discussion.
“Social media gives us instant feedback on what resonates with our readers,” Zelikman says. “We are very happy with the warm welcome we received in our community. Since launch, new readers keep coming to the site.”
With community stewardship as a central tenet of journalism, any news site that has a paywall — or is considering one — should keep the social reading experience at the forefront of its strategy. The frustration of clicking a link that leads to inaccessible content will turn readers away, often leaving them with harsh feelings toward the site. Gradually assimilating readers to a site’s breadth of content will foster loyalty, and, in turn, build a stronger community.
Interested in more Journalism resources? Check out Mashable Explore, a new way to discover information on your favorite Mashable topics.Image courtesy of iStockphoto, narvikk
More About: dallas morning news, digital publishing, honolulu civil beat, journalism, media, new york times, News, newspaper, paywall, social media, The Economist
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