[Closed] Financially supporting The Guardian

Just read the headline on the Daily Wail and assume the opposite

I don't know the answer, but I can't help but worry slightly what will happen if the (arguably) quality newspaper sites end up behind paywalls and the gutter press remains free. Perhaps it'd be better for society as a whole if the reverse were true.

Anyone being persuaded by this, from any direction of the political compass? A healthy newspaper like the G seems essential, IMHO, from wherever you sit

I'm not, no, because it has gone down the toilet since Alan Rusbridger left. And that, in part, is why they're now reduced to the begging bowl.

I'm a Guardian supporter, been so for a year or so. £5 a month is cheap for quality journalism.

I have given them a bit of money. I expect that their quality would drop rather than ending up behind a paywall - they'd lose so much on advertising revenue by going behind a paywall that it might not even be financially beneficial.

I thought they had a trust set up for funding?

I thought they had a trust set up for funding?

Paper & website still run at a loss every year, so eventually the fund will run out....

Anyone being persuaded by this

Yes.

Because we need something that at least makes an effort. It's not perfect, but look at the ****ing alternatives.

They'll have to move to some kind of paid model eventually IMO.

Either that or introduce their own sidebar of shame to drum up much more traffic.

Markie - Member

I thought they had a trust set up for funding?

Yes.

Because we need something that at least makes an effort. It's not perfect, but look at the **** alternatives.

Out of curiosity, how many welcome packs did they send you? I took a pile of their Jute bags to a charity shop the other WE, seem to get one every few months...

I've even mailed them asking them not to send me any more!

They're being bankrolled by AutoTrader at the mo.

They'll be ****ed when Google and FB manage to grab that market too.

Guardian supporter
Still buy a printed Observer,just cause I like the whole Sunday paper thing.

I might have been inclined to support them (as I did in the past) if they had been less enthusiastic in seizing every opportunity to indulge in Corbyn-bashing. I can get that for free from jamba and binners.

I might have been inclined to support them (as I did in the past) if they had been less enthusiastic in seizing every opportunity to indulge in Corbyn-bashing.

yes, that was a test, I did consider cancelling, but then if the Guardian folded, we'd all be worse off for it.

They do seem to have calmed down a bit and realised he's not the Devil incarnate...

For years this 'newspaper' strongly denied the existence of Muslim rape gangs, they scuppered any serious debate and threw insults at anyone brave enough to tell their story. Hundreds if not thousands of vulnerable children were abused and the authorities turned a blind eye for fear of being outed as 'racists' by the guardian and their ilk. And their reader base are just as blinkered sitting on their fictitious moral high ground.

I've been paid up for a year or so now, very good value for the reading I do. I'm trying to put my money toward products and causes I believe have an overall positive effect, this is one of them.

For years this 'newspaper' strongly denied the existence of Muslim rape gangs, they scuppered any serious debate and threw insults at anyone brave enough to tell their story. Hundreds if not thousands of vulnerable children were abused and the authorities turned a blind eye for fear of being outed as 'racists' by the guardian and their ilk. And their reader base are just as blinkered sitting on their fictitious moral high ground.

Is that a "no" for support then?

I won't when they can't even get the basics right like the amount of possession a team has in football match. Their business section is also poor compared to the competition.

On a similar vein the Telegraph has recently added pay for 'Premium' articles. I think they are all in trouble eventually and we'll end up with a world of free dross and expensive quality, with little in-between. Pretty much how the high street is evolving as well.

or years this 'newspaper' strongly denied the existence of Muslim rape gangs

Nothing is perfect, and never will be. A more pragmatic test is do you think the world is a better place for it or without it?

On a similar vein the Telegraph has recently added pay for 'Premium' articles.

Their volume and quality of online articles has really dropped in the last two years, so much so, I wouldn't pay 5p to see their Premium articles...

I'm paying, they're by no means perfect but looking at how much the Telegraph has recently turned into buzzfeed I would quite like to have at least one news site that's not totally awful.

I've just chipped in to a crowd funder for independent alternative media, ill see if can find the link.
The mainstream and gutter press can go swivel as far as I'm concerned.

I considered this for a while and thought "nah". But I signed up last week because boycotting the shite press isn't going to achieve much when I never read it before. Positive steps rather than negative actions, kinda.

i signed up as a member for £50 a year.

now on the app, where all those 'please give us money' blocks that interrupt the text on my work pc sit, you get blocks saying 'thanks for giving us money' interrupting the articles instead. which is equally annoying 😆

I'm paying, they're by no means perfect but looking at how much the Telegraph has recently turned into buzzfeed I would quite like to have at least one news site that's not totally awful.

yes, any day soon all headlines will start with "this one weird trick..."

https://tompride.wordpress.com/2016/11/14/bye-bye-murdoch-how-you-can-help-set-up-a-media-revolution-in-the-uk/

I won't when they can't even get the basics right like the amount of possession a team has in football match. Their business section is also poor compared to the competition.

TBF you probably shouldn't buy the Grauniad for sports or finance coverage anyway.

we'll end up with a world of free dross and expensive quality

Online subscription could be moderately priced, as on this site.

I keep thinking about an FT subscription, but it's about 50% above what it's worth to me, so I've never dabbled. 25% off at the moment though...

Happy to pay subs for FT at the moment. But not really the rest of the broadsheets. Too much topping and tailing standards reports, so you know how the same basic story will be spun by the Times, Guardian and Torygraph before opening the papers and the rest of the news can be accessed directly any way.

Guardian lost £60m last year

I used to buy the paper and also had a paid app subscription for a while (£5 for 6 months I think ?)

These days the reporting is mostly rubbish. The ads where so intrusive I took action ( 😉 ) so that I am no longer bothered by them. This is their problem, intrusive ads and no way the articles are worth £60 pa

FT reporting around the financial crises was so bad I stopped buying the paper. They deleted a comment of mine on an article saying whilst what I said "had a lot of merit" they could not tolerate me pointing out how wrong the journalist (obvious very junior hack) was. Not a snowballs chance I would pay 25% of what they ask for a subscription.

Paid subscriptions need to be much cheaper or ad supported. Why would I pay multiples of an STW sub to read news I can get for free on TV ?

Commie propaganda. The sooner it folder the better as far as I'm concerned.

TBF you probably shouldn't buy the Grauniad for sports or finance coverage anyway

Their Cricket and Rugby coverage is very good IMO, that's how i got into reading the rest of it from time to time

I'm paying its need more than ever IMO.

To me the rather large elephant in the room in all discussions about online news media is the BBC. The fact that it has an extremely extensive and wide reaching world renowned news site available for free immediately limits the opportunities for every other media provider. I must say that I use it a lot and am glad it exists, but wouldn't like to be a competitor in the current climate.

I've stopped looking at BBC News, the quality and depth seems to have fallen of a cliff several years ago..

I mainly read Guardian, Independent and FT online (can see quite a few FT articles for free by clearing cookies).

I used to subscribe to the Times, as I really liked some of the writers (Simon Barnes), but the rest of the paper and the general thurst got so Daily Mail that I chucked it. Now subscribe to the Guardian through app store.

Can be a bit too lentil-weaving some times, but some good writing, opinion and comment, sports pages also generally good.

We need this newspaper

BTW watched Snowden last night - had forgotten Guardian had broken that story. Guardian turned down the MP's expenses story so the Telegragph got it

Footflaps imo Newsnight is worth watching, normal bbc news I generally don't bother with. Sky or Channel 4 but a lot of independents like Vice

I read it online because its free and mostly not too bad. They wont last long being free however.

Sadly the way advertising works now only the social media giants will left. Right now probably most people get their news from FB.

When its pay to read I will have to think hard, but in the end I suppose there is little choice.

Still, traditional newspapers are on the way out even if they do charge to read. The income will be too small to pay for quality journalism.

If you aren't going to read the Sports or Buisness pages, then that doesn't leave much left. I have no need to pay for Monibot's or Tonybee's latest lecturing and hypocrisy.

Far easier to get your news from where all the papers get it:

[url= http://uk.reuters.com/ ]Reuters[/url]

Support the Guardian?

Have they become a charity!?

When I was immature and poorly world educated, I used to think Monbiot a prick...

If you aren't going to read the Sports or Buisness pages, then that doesn't leave much left. I have no need to pay for Monibot's or Tonybee's latest lecturing and hypocrisy.

Totally agree, pretty much why I don't read it myself.

Far easier to get your news from where all the papers get it:
Reuters

Absolutely, so I think it's the commentary, context and investigations that will allow newspapers to continue to have a role (and to justify charging).

The NY Times guy was good on this stuff in a recent episode of The Media Show...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00dv9hq/episodes/downloads

Rusbridger destroyed the Guardian, he made huge investments in journalism especially in the US on the basis he could make money out of digital advertising - unlike anyone else - and racked up millions of losses. "But it's got great journalism" - well hello, lots of things are great when you spend unsustainable amounts of money on them, all the other papers have to survive on spending within their means. At least this is recognized now and he didn't get the Chairmanship of the Scott Trust. The sooner he gets kicked out of LMH the better, there he has decided to make those noted intellectual leviathans, Cumberbatch and Watson visiting fellows, tosser.

BTW this is a no.

Have you seen their flash new office alongside Kings Cross? Meanwhile the old one on Farringdon Road is currently being demolished. How much of last years loss was due to a building they can't afford?

ironically, just received this email

With populism sweeping away elites and institutions, and fake news driving out truth, the world needs access to its greatest minds more than ever. Only informed, trustworthy, independent, and above all fact-based analysis can enable the world to understand – and confront – the mounting forces of global disorder.

And yet crippling financial and political pressures are weakening the media’s ability to provide this crucial public good.

We are not immune to these pressures.

We will never compromise our standards. But, without your help, we cannot sustain Project Syndicate’s unique brand of high-quality, high-impact coverage of the events, trends, and forces shaping our world.

We need your support. Now.

Please donate and help us to continue delivering the ideas that matter most to readers everywhere.

Well, its quite clear the Guardian doesn't understand populism you just have to look at their subscriber numbers to see that.

In modern society, we have an oversupply of information but a mass deficit of knowledge. Far too much and far too frequent news. Far too little analysis and consideration.

I like to read the guardian to have something to disagree with. I'm scared of having nothing to do so I subscribed. I subscribe to STW for similar reasons.

Well, its quite clear the Guardian doesn't understand populism you just have to look at their subscriber numbers to see that.

Well the Daily Mail / Sun are the most popular, hardly a great benefit to society though...

I keep considering it, I know it's a bit of an echo chamber for my own personal biases, but I'm not sure what an alternative that I would trust is. Best of a bad lot I guess.

On the same note I like to keep buying the Private Eye, not news as such but feels like it keeps you somewhat honest (and enraged, even the small boring stories of inept/corrupt politicians and councilors are pretty scandalous at times)

Well the Daily Mail / Sun are the most popular, hardly a great benefit to society though...

Journalism is a trade, not some sort of higher calling, so they would appear to be doing it right.

I know it's a bit of an echo chamber for my own personal biases, but I'm not sure what an alternative that I would trust is.

All media is. That's why rather than choosing the right one, you should choose several diverse outlets.

Journalism is a trade, not some sort of higher calling,

Not quite convinced there. Journalism is an essential part of democracy; which is itself an effort to govern the world for the greatest benefit to the most people. So it's important.

Ideally we would simply have facts, but it's not possible to do that without bias since you have to have an editor because you cannot simply report everything that happens - there'd be too much. So the editor's decisions give bias - it's unavoidable.

[quote=molgrips ]

I know it's a bit of an echo chamber for my own personal biases, but I'm not sure what an alternative that I would trust is.

Apparently the Daily Mail website reached 199.4 million unique monthly visitors in December 2014 😯

It's worth for the cryptic crossword alone.

Well, its quite clear the Guardian doesn't understand populism you just have to look at their subscriber numbers to see that.

Journalism is a trade, not some sort of higher calling,

Any your point is what exactly? All that matters is readership numbers?

Ideally we would simply have facts,

If you look at the stuff going across the newswires (i.e. Reuters, PA and Bloomberg), then it is fairly devoid of heavy opinion.

What's interesting about the internet world vs print, is that if you buy a paper I doubt you read many of the opinion pieces and often they are buried in the middle of the paper, but online they are much more heavily promoted as they are the USP and attract clicks.

Cougar - Moderator
I don't know the answer, but I can't help but worry slightly what will happen if the (arguably) quality newspaper sites end up behind paywalls and the gutter press remains free. Perhaps it'd be better for society as a whole if the reverse were true.

Probably inevitable, because there isn't a large, wealthy corporate organisation whose interests would be served by funding a newspaper like the Guardian. This fact alone is testament to the importance of news organisations like the Guardian in the modern world.

I flew to London last week for work for the first time in a while - I was initially surprised, then dismayed, to see both of Murdoch's flagship papers available for free throughout the airport.

This is a pretty sinister state of affairs IMO. Typical free papers like the Metro, full of lightweight fluff, are one thing but both the Murdoch titles aren't simply newspapers, they're political instruments.

Murdoch[i] (& Dacre ) [/i] titles aren't simply newspapers, they're political instruments.

And it would seem that more folk are gradually becoming aware of that fact

And it would seem that more folk are gradually becoming aware of that fact

What makes you say that? (interested)

The campaigns like i linked to above to fund independent journalism, its definately been noticed in the Canary, independent blogs such as AAV & Prides Purge & Anarchist press i frequent, also the campaigns in Liverpool which has spread futher afeild ,to remove Murdoch press from the city -although ill grant there is an emotional context involved with that campaign

Aren't we all already financially supporting the Guardian?

Just look how little corporation tax they paid on the sale of Autotrader.

Does that mean Beecroft no longer profits from Autotrader?

Typical free papers like the Metro, full of lightweight fluff, are one thing but both the Murdoch titles aren't simply newspapers, they're political instruments.

Of course, you know who publishes the Metro, don't you?

Any your point is what exactly? All that matters is readership numbers?

In the jargon of management, it is a Key Performance Indicator. The simple fact is that the Mail and the Sun are highly successful, this enables them to invest in their businesses. The Mail is one of the few papers to still have a comprehensive training programme, many of its graduates end up at papers such as the Guardian.

The Guardian is as bad as the Daily Mail, Just from a very slightly different angle.

I pay for it every time I open some clickbait article written by an apparently current 6th former about her time on a bus which had two different kinds D's of sexualities on it...

I used to buy it every day, until about 5 years ago. Maybe I've changed but it's a load of shit currently.

In five years time, people may well look back on the idea of print media as rather quaint. I only get one broadsheet in hard copy and that is because of my wife's subscription, I skim read 3-4 broadsheets on ipad first thing - some of which I set up with bespoke feeds.

Ditto will MTB or any other sports magazines exist in hard copy format in 5 years time? Ditto TV. We are moving to a bespoke, digital world.

Newspapers need to evolve like anything else.

It was rubbisher what done it in! Together with failed investments in the us and into online content!

There are some good pieces led by the Guardian but the Trust that owns the grauniad has frankly gone to far down the road of allowing the editors to follow poorly thought out strategies for growth. (Or indeed survival).

The simple fact is that the Mail and the Sun are highly successful, this enables them to invest in their businesses.

I would argue they succeed at the expense of society. Making money spreading racism and hatred is hardly something to be lauded.

The fact the Daily Mail is successful is a National disgrace IMO.

Like politicians, we get the rags we deserve. People want to buy this stuff. Sad but true. They will not pay for quality hard print journalism even when it is cheaper than a cup of coffee. Hence the proponents of posttruthpolitics get away with murder.

...Anyone being persuaded by this

yes, it seems reasonable to me that journalists should be professionals, and all things considered, The Grauniad seems to do the least-worst job of all the other options.

Before I joined this forum, I don't think I'd ever met anyone who read the Guardian....still haven't I suppose. I never ever saw anyone reading it either, even when I commuted to the City for about five years. (okay maybe one or two oddballs)

Iz it becoz I iz from the Surrey massive??

sparksmcguff - Member

It was rubbisher what done it in! Together with failed investments in the us and into online content!

His editor / journalism track record is off the charts - is any editor more lauded in recent times? He added huge investigative bite to a paper that never had any standing in that department. The phone-hacking scandal is a milestone in UK journalism that he pursued for 2 years in the face of total indifference - seismic story and the dead souls of NotW hacks now trail in his wake.

Now we digest news via social media on the whole, we only want to read news that backs up our own world view. We wont be fed news that doesn't conform to that, let alone click on it if it suggest we may be wrong.

The Daily Fail is popular because it backs up the majority of peoples views.

Most of us on STW are in the tiny minority. That minority wont pay for proper journalism even if we all subscribed.

I think we are seeing the end of journalism as we know it basically.

The last two big election results (Brexit and Trump) show how social media is so important. It also shows how out of touch the institutions we put our hope/trust and faith in are now.

we only want to read news that backs up our own world view. We wont be fed news that doesn't conform to that, let alone click on it if it suggest we may be wrong.

I hear this kind of thing a lot, but it's an exaggeration (and that's being kind).

Why do you think the BBC has been so successful online?

Because despite what some left and right wingers say, it's relatively neutral and trustworthy.

I've already given Guardian Media Group plenty of cash. Indirectly, by paying some of the tax which its parent Trust should have stumped up instead of squirrelling it away via a tax haven.

http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/2016/04/will-the-guardian-now-investigate-its-own-tax-arrangements/

As an aside for those that care about the press please read this and write to your MP if you agree, we are currently in the midst of a Government consultation on press regulation

http://hackinginquiry.org/latest-news/10-week-government-consultation-sign-up-to-help-us-give-press-victims-a-voice/

Why do you think the BBC has been so successful online?

Because it spends more than anyone else, Dacre wrote an article in the Guardian a few years ago which says the BBC has 8,000 journalists whereas the Mail has 400.