John and Dan talk a bunch about the business model of Penny Arcade now that [they have a Kickstarter campaign on][penny].

The real interesting talk is when they discuss the fact that advertisers will pay more for access to users than users will pay for access to content. It got me thinking again about the [new business model][nb] on [TBR][tbr] (which I already wrote about][abt]). The big issue with so many membership sites is that as more do it, I’m less likely to pay for the next one.

John says he listens to a number of podcasts and he could only think of one that he’d donate to if it went members only.

Totally not against membership sites, but I think that users are going to quickly hit membership fatigue. That means other business models will have to be explored if you want to write without having sponsors or advertisers.

[hyper]: http://5by5.tv/hypercritical/76 “Hypercritical – Selling a Dream”
[penny]: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/575109064/penny-arcade-sells-out
[tbr]: http://brooksreview.net/
[nb]: http://brooksreview.net/members/
[abt]: https://curtismchale.ca/2012/07/12/web-writing-business-models/

2 responses to “Hypercritical on Business Models”

  1. Eric Mann Avatar

    I wonder if there would be value in a curated membership network. As in, you pay once to get access to a group of sites like TBR and all of the site owners get a cut. This would still benefit the producers of good content (they’d have to earn their way in and keep producing to stay in the network), but it would avoid burning the users out on signups.

  2. curtismchale Avatar
    curtismchale

    I was listening to a podcast recently where they floated that idea (I think the B&B Podcast).

    They put forward that there are many groups of sites that ‘play’ off each other. The issue is, you’de need a huge number of readers (much more than individual memberships need) to make it financially viable. At least that’s the theory.