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asymmetricinfo's profile
Megan McArdle
Megan McArdle
Megan McArdle
Verified account
@asymmetricinfo

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Megan McArdleVerified account

@asymmetricinfo

Columnist at the Washington Post. Opinions my own. Email me: Megan.McArdle -at- http://washpost.com  Buy my book, The Up Side of Down http://amzn.to/1a3i2tK 

Washington, DC
Joined September 2008

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    Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

    All right, folks, I have exactly one half hour to Tweetstorm my latest column, and explain just how bad the economics of the media industry are. Subtitle: why you can't have all the awesome free journalism you want and have come to expect. Let's go!https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2018/04/26/a-farewell-to-free-journalism/?utm_term=.923629bee042 …

    1:57 PM - 26 Apr 2018
    • 949 Retweets
    • 1,532 Likes
    • Add your name Luigi Vercotti, Jr. Antoni Wroblewski Zach Finley Marti Sanchez Robert Hogg Remote Teams Briefly Krish Jimmy Thomson
    129 replies 949 retweets 1,532 likes
      1. New conversation
      2. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        Question 1) I read too many sites to pay for subscription to all of them! Answer: That is a pity, because they cannot afford to give you journalism unless you subscribe, and will go out of business, at which point you won't be able to read them.

        20 replies 30 retweets 188 likes
        Show this thread
      3. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        Question 2) Okay, I get that. So how about a Spotify/Netflix style service, where we bundle all the subscriptions in one place. Why can't that work? Answer 2) It can work! Just not at the price you are imagining, which is, I am betting, somewhere around the $20 mark.

        28 replies 12 retweets 144 likes
        Show this thread
      4. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        To report one column (next week's print column), I have already spent four hours on the phone, more hours doing research, and a really fun-filled weekend with taxpayer files. That's not that unusual.

        25 replies 14 retweets 131 likes
        Show this thread
      5. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        Someone has to pay for that time, because my bank will not accept mortgage payment in the form of retweets. And I write opinion! Reported stuff is even more time consuming. For one 2500 word column a month at the Atlantic, I spent 25-50% of my month reporting.

        14 replies 18 retweets 228 likes
        Show this thread
      6. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        Also I have editors and IT folks and stuff backing me up. All of this costs $$$. And the thing is, writers like to pay their mortgage *every* month. Editors like to eat *every* day. They don't want to get paid by the click. And you don't really want them to get paid by the click

        5 replies 17 retweets 197 likes
        Show this thread
      7. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        I know this because you are *constantly* complaining to me about clickbait, and the sites that live on it. That's what news looks like in a Spotify scenario. All of it. But that's not even the biggest problem. (See how I hooked you to read the next tweet there? Clickbait. :)

        4 replies 13 retweets 222 likes
        Show this thread
      8. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        Spotify just isn't working for artists. I mean, it's better than the alternative, which is having your stuff pirated, and getting nothing. But it's not a whole lot better than that.https://spinditty.com/industry/why-so-many-artists-hate-spotify …

        7 replies 17 retweets 135 likes
        Show this thread
      9. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        The difference is that people have always made music as a hobby, for attention and applause, long before there was a music industry. People will do it for love, and for the hope of winning the tournament.

        4 replies 10 retweets 93 likes
        Show this thread
      10. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        No one's going to cover the USDA for love. (Except some lobbying firm, maybe, but then you're not really going to trust the journalism).

        8 replies 12 retweets 159 likes
        Show this thread
      11. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        Also, it's really hard to get people to come see you read your reporting at a live event, or buy your t-shirt. We can't use it as a loss leader for ancillary revenue streams.

        9 replies 9 retweets 120 likes
        Show this thread
      12. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        The craziest thing is, it's not even clear that the Spotify model is working *for Spotify*. It's the most successful model of its kind in the world, and the company's financials are brutal:https://www.ft.com/content/974206c0-2609-11e8-b27e-cc62a39d57a0 …

        3 replies 27 retweets 144 likes
        Show this thread
      13. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        So yeah, I get why you want this. I'd love it to! But the math doesn't work.

        1 reply 5 retweets 75 likes
        Show this thread
      14. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        And this leads me to a broader point: most people have a seriously, seriously warped view of what stuff is supposed to cost. So when they propose business models, they sound like teenagers talking about how Dad should buy them a car. I say this with love. I'm guilty too.

        12 replies 77 retweets 396 likes
        Show this thread
      15. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        RIght now, *huge* portions of your tech consumption are being financed by burning VC money. Uber. Spotify. Many of those new media sites you guys have been telling me "prove" that it is totally possible to do good journalism on a free model.

        5 replies 64 retweets 267 likes
        Show this thread
      16. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        There have been three big waves of media startups in the last twenty years. The third wave is currently in the "Figure out a business model or close up shop" phase of the cycle. Making predictions is folly, but here's a prediction: there won't be a fourth wave.

        4 replies 27 retweets 154 likes
        Show this thread
      17. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        The economics just never got better. We're currently exhausting the last wave of stupid cheap money that is going to flow into this business.

        6 replies 19 retweets 130 likes
        Show this thread
      18. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        There *are* business models that currently work. But there's no guarantee they work for long--witness the current wave of site shutdowns after a Facebook algorithm switch gutted yet more revenue streams. And they're not big enough to support a lot of broad-spectrum journalism.

        2 replies 12 retweets 101 likes
        Show this thread
      19. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        The Facebook/Google dominance of ad revenue just keeps getting worse for us, and shows no signs of stopping. And why would it? They've got a captive audience with remarkable micro-targeting capabilities no one else can match.

        6 replies 25 retweets 123 likes
        Show this thread
      20. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        When the stupid money burns out, it will look less obvious that free works. Just my opinion. But I've had no reason to change it in recent months. The remnants of the first and second waves of media startups are now getting bought for fractions of their peak valuations.

        4 replies 15 retweets 92 likes
        Show this thread
      21. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        If they are surviving at all. And this is broadly true in lots of categories: eventually Uber is going to have to charge you what it actually cots to deliver a ride, or go out of business. Eventually Spotify will have to make a stable profit, or die.

        7 replies 28 retweets 128 likes
        Show this thread
      22. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        I am not saying this with triumph! I love Spotify! I love Uber! But math is math, and stupid money runs out.

        6 replies 20 retweets 125 likes
        Show this thread
      23. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        Over the last 25 years, enormous sums have been spent in the hopes that your investment is the next Amazon/Facebook/Google. But there is a reason there are only three of these names. People are starting to realize that.

        1 reply 26 retweets 123 likes
        Show this thread
      24. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        And that brings me to the hidden subsidy to much web journalism that no one talks about much: the human capital subsidy.

        1 reply 16 retweets 127 likes
        Show this thread
      25. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        By way of illustration: a hidden problem with Uber's business model is that, AFAICT, Uber drivers mostly don't do what professional taxi and truck drivers do, and factor in vehicle depreciation as a business expense.

        7 replies 31 retweets 183 likes
        Show this thread
      26. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        This makes them think that they are making more than they are, an illusion that will be brutally punctured when their vehicle craps out and they have to buy another. Something similar can be seen in the new media model.

        2 replies 18 retweets 159 likes
        Show this thread
      27. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        Old journalism HR model: work for an alt-weekly or local paper and work your way up, or maybe stay at the local, not making a great salary, but you're living somewhere cheap & the job is pretty fun.

        1 reply 11 retweets 98 likes
        Show this thread
      28. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        New media model: Get right into writing opinion/analysis journalism with no boring intervening steps covering the school board at a new media site. Or if lucky, go to work for one of the big legacy outlets, which are few in number.

        3 replies 17 retweets 123 likes
        Show this thread
      29. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        I was one of the very first creatures of the new media model. I blogged for years, started working for The Economist on the web, and worked my way up to an amazing job courtesy of The Atlantic, Newsweek, Bloomberg, and the Post.

        2 replies 9 retweets 93 likes
        Show this thread
      30. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        The hours I logged in my early years as a professional blogger were insane. I regularly worked 16 hours a day, 7 days a week. It's not literally true that I never stopped working, but it sure felt like it. A lot of young journalists today do that to feed the click beast.

        11 replies 13 retweets 117 likes
        Show this thread
      31. Megan McArdle‏Verified account @asymmetricinfo 26 Apr 2018

        The problem is, you can't keep it up. Journalism doesn't pay well enough to outsource your life once you have a family. Also you get old and tired and you just don't have the stamina.

        8 replies 21 retweets 161 likes
        Show this thread
      32. 10 more replies

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