ap Inc. will start charging a fee for some articles on two of its newspapers’ websites in May, adopting a pay system similar to that announced last month by the New York Times Co.
The newspapers, in York, Pa., and Chico, Calif., will give users free access to as many as 25 “premium” articles monthly, after which they’ll have to pay an undetermined fee unless they subscribe to the print newspapers, said MediaNews president Joseph Lodovic.
Premium content may include certain columns and investigative reporting, he said.
“Most of our content will remain free,” Lodovic said Thursday in an e-mail. “Once subscribed, the reader will have access to all premium across ap.”
MediaNews is adopting a so-called metered pay wall to charge readers, similar to the one in place at the Financial Times and to a plan announced by New York Times.
MediaNews, the closely held publisher of The Denver Post, may expand the pay wall to more of its 54 U.S. dailies, Lodovic said.
The holding company for MediaNews, Affiliated Media Inc., filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection two weeks ago after getting approval to restructure from its lenders.
MediaNews, based in Denver, said in November that it planned to charge for some content on the sites of the Chico Enterprise-Record and York Daily Record. The newspapers will determine which content they designate as premium, and it probably will include coupons and puzzles, Lodovic said. Subscribers to the print newspapers will have full access to the Web or may face a small, undetermined “up-charge,” he said.
