The New York Times on Thursday outlined its long in the making plans to put up a paywall and start offering subscriptions. Everyone will get their first 20 articles per month for free, but further reading will need a monthly subscription. A $15 per month plan offers full web access as well as a smartphone app; $20 per month swaps out the phone for the iPad, and an unusually steep hike to $35 is required to get both phone and iPad use.
Everyone who subscribes to the physical newspaper gets unlimited access to the digital version, except on e-readers like the Kindle and the Nook. That will improve in the future, the NYT said.
It will also implement in-app subscription as an option to fit in with Apple’s current App Store subscription policies. Without changes to the app, Apple would theoretically ban the NYT offer from the iPhone and iPad. Subscriptions in native apps have to also have an iTunes equivalent, and Apple doesn’t have a subscription mechanism that would allow its downloads as free bonuses for print.
Subscriptions take effect on March 28.
