Vulture, The Cut and Other New York Magazine Websites to Go Behind Paywall

“We want to allow for discovery and exploration of our sites, while putting a value on the journalism we produce,” New York Media CEO Pam Wasserstein says

New York Magazine
(Photo by Eugene Gologursky/Getty Images for New York Magazine)

New York Magazine plans to put its online content behind a paywall, the publication announced on Monday. The move follows that of Bloomberg Media, The Atlantic and Condé Nast’s Vanity Fair,

The subscription service, which will cost $5 per month, will cover New York Magazine’s full network of verticals:  Vulture, the Cut, Intelligencer, the Strategist, and Grub Street, which combined currently publish about 150 stories per day. A redesigned NYMag.com homepage will launch simultaneously with the subscription product, to help users more easily discover the wide variety of content from the New York Media network.

“We want to allow for discovery and exploration of our sites, while putting a value on the journalism we produce,” said New York Media CEO Pam Wasserstein in a blog post announcing the change. “We’re aiming to separate casual browsers from superfans, and forge a deeper relationship with those fans who are passionate about what we do.”

The new pricing model, which goes into effect the last week of November, will give readers access to an unspecified number of stories for free before shutting off access. Readers will be prompted to subscribe based on a combination of factors, according to the company, including the types of stories they read, and depth of visits in a particular vertical.

Current print subscribers will receive access to the digital product at no additional cost, while new digital plus print subscriptions will cost $70 per year.

“New York has expanded far beyond its namesake city, both in its scope of coverage and audience, but the New York way of looking at the world remains the common thread through all that we do,” said editor-in-chief Adam Moss. “With this new subscription offering, we’re hoping to introduce more readers to the breadth of our coverage that has the same sensibility and journalistic quality.”

New York Media’s decision to place its content behind a paywall comes at a time when revenue from magazine publishing is on the decline. According to PwC, global magazine publishing is expected to see total global revenues decline over the coming five years from $68.43 billion in 2015 to $66.62 billion in 2020.

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