• To encourage readers to sign up at launch, the Sun will offer a special introductory rate of 99 cents for the first four weeks.
• After the first month, digital-only subscribers will pay$2.49 a week or $49.99 for 26 weeks.
• Print subscribers will receive a special reduced rate of 75 cents a week or $29.99 a year.
• Non-subscribers will have free access to 15 web pages a month.

Randy Bagert, editor of Swift’s Greeley (CO) Tribune announced the comment ‘pause’ last April by saying, “Why don’t we just delete the worst of the comments, you ask? Well, we can. But it takes too much time to monitor.” At the time, he said discontinuing comments was just a test.

This week The Digital Test Kitchen reports that it is working on a test project with Swift and the Tribune research project  “to devise ways to rein in the sometimes-ugly and nasty nature of user comments on newspaper websites.” “Swift will not revive user comments on its newspapers’ websites until the company decides on and implements a new content management system (CMS) to serve all the sites.” The new CMS will not be implemented until 2012 or 2013.

Can a newspaper truly be part of the community dialogue without comments? (Some would argue the Letter to the Editor is still a viable option.) Or do busy site staffs simply not have the time for comment moderation?

“What we noticed was that there were really two audiences going to Boston.com,” publisher Chris Mayer told TheWrap.com. “One type of reader was looking for general news and information, breaking news, anything that was happening, things to do and e-commerce — what you’d use a community portal for.”

This interesting split strategy may soon serve as a model for other newspapers who want to serve two very different types of audiences – one that is willing to pay for timely hard news and the other that is more casual and looking more for lighter local fare like events and shopping.

Some lessons learned from local news publishers:

• Tightening the paywall:  The Augusta Chronicle started with a paywall that allowed 25 free articles and has slowly tightened it to 10 articles per month.
• Some advertisers are specifically interested in the paid audience: “”We have seen some interest in advertisers willing to pay specifically to have their ads served to the paying audience,” says Chronicle editor Alan English.
• Remain focused on quality local news content: Jason Collingwood, web editor for The Tulsa World, now has his staff updating the site 80 to 90 times a day with hyper local news.
• Requiring print subscribers to opt out of digital can produce great results: The Concord Monitor increased its print rates to account for the new digital access and gave their print subscribers the option of opting out of digital. Only 10% opted out, resulting in a  “tremendous boost to revenue.”

Those subscribers are paying $14.99 a year’s worth of monthly editions– $2 more than a $12.99 print subscription. Popular Science also sold 2,500 individual copies of the March edition of the iPad app at $4.99 each, according to a report in Ad Age.

Other publishers have hesitated to offer iPad subscriptions because of concerns about Apple’s terms, which include taking a reported 30% cut of revenue and not sharing subscribers’ personal information. But Popular Science was one of the first magazines to embrace the recurring-billing plan for apps when Apple launched the service in February.

Greg Hano, a VP at Bonnier’s Technology Group, acknowledged that they don’t know who is subscribing to Popular Science iPad app, so they’re not sure whether they are new readers or print subscribers switching to digital. It’s likely a mix of both, which is why Hano said they are excited by the opportunity to let people “test” the app on their iPad and easily upgrade to a subscription.

On April 1, Popular Science was the 37th highest-grossing app in the Apple App Store. Only the New York Post’s app (29th) and The Daily (5th) ranked higher for magazine/newspaper premium content apps.

Beck’s production company has been staffing up and expanding its roster of web TV shows offered as part of the Insider Extreme membership plan on Beck’s website. The site also simulcasts Beck’s three-hour radio show and other free audio programs, leading some observers to speculate that he’s planning to launch his own Oprah-style cable network or a hybrid online/cable media venture.

Forbes magazine estimates that Beck’s web operations earned $4 million in 2010 – double his $2 million earnings from Fox. Insider Extreme memberships cost $9.95 a month, $44.95 for six months, or $74.95 annually.

The surprising thing to the NAA was just how many newspaper execs showed up for the live webinar when it was first broadcast in December 2010. They told us just over a couple of dozen attendees would be normal. Instead more than 100 folks attended.

This was hugely heartening for us because newspapers desperately need this information. During our research for the presentation we could not find one single example of a good newspaper paywall. Not one! Newspaper paywalls are — frankly — scary bad. They just ignore all best practices.

Why is that? My theory is that newspaper site design is really difficult – it’s a science in itself. You’re dealing with heavy text, complex navigation, and hundreds of thousands of pages… Plus, on top of making this dense content easily navigatible, you also have to deal with the demands of advertisers — get them enough clicks to keep paying while not sacrificing all your screen space.

Paywall design requires a completely different skill set. The goal is paid conversion, not free navigation. The content is focused, not comprehensive. Psychologically, the audience isn’t looking at the page because they want to be there, but because they’re forced to be there.

Other niches in the subscription site industry have been testing, researching and refining their paywalls for close to 15 years now. Audience development executives and web designers for newspapers can learn a lot from them. I’m psyched that so many folks came to our live webinar because it shows the newspaper industry is ready to get serious about selling online subscriptions properly.

Hopefully someday we can do a revised version of this presentation and show examples of good newspaper paywalls. If you know of one, please post the URL in comments below. Newspaper web designers need positive reinforcement

In the meantime, to see our free video training yourself, go here.

I don’t care about the politics in the nearest big city to my home.  I don’t need generic people-features written at a 6th grade level.  What else have you got to offer me?

The average US citizen moves home – often fairly dramatically — seven times in their life.  Their local community, let alone the big city their suburban home is nearest, isn’t that interesting to them.  They didn’t go to high school with the mayor, and their cousin’s company isn’t up for that big county road resurfacing gig.   Their kids may not go to the public schools, heck they may not leave home at all.  If they’re passionate about a local sports team, in all likelihood they get the coverage directly from a sports-specialist publisher.

In fact, their passions — and when we pay for content, we pay for passion and/or extreme convenience — are as likely to be shared with disparate friends, family, colleagues and fellow enthusiasts dispersed all across America, not in their local region.    We don’t live local lives emotionally anymore.

As the voice of the local, how can newspapers survive as paid content?  My suggestion — split yourself into niches.  For example, I’d pay for a crime watch emailed police blotter by zip code.  In a big fat heartbeat.   And we all know the obits sell.  Not to mention, the handpicked Best Yardsales for each weekend — especially if I can sign up by neighborhood.  And, if you can send me a screensaver-worthy photo of my own kid at the soccer game, I’d pay.

I know none of this stuff is classic newspaper journalism.  It’s content the intern could put out with a little help from your tech department.  And, yes I do wish there were more outlets for the glory of news journalism too — maybe a “shocking consumer rip-offs” or “biggest political stupidity” site that gathers best-of stories from across the entire USA?  But, subscribe to a general info newspaper for my area?  I think not.

The only other online revenue source that scored even higher, was blog sponsorships, with 56% of magazine execs saying these had profit margins of more than 30%.  Think I’ll call up my friend Henry Copeland at BlogAds, a great network that sells ads across loads of third party blogs,  and see if he wants to get a beer to celebrate!