We talk to president and founder of Newsy, Jim Spencer, about the inspiration behind Newsy, mobile video news, the company’s latest $1.5M funding round, and what makes Newsy different from other video news sources.
Launch a social media campaign that will build your brand and deliver results in our online Social Media Marketing Boot Camp starting June 7. Speakers include Abigail Cusick (Bravo Digital), Gregory Galant (Sawhorse Media), Alex Leo (Thomson Reuters Digital), Jim Tobin (Ignite Social Media), and many more. Read the reviews. 
Ongo, a new subscription based news service backed by the Washington Post, Gannett, and the New York Times, is betting that users will pay $6.99 a month for ad free online news.
Founder Alex Kazim, an eBay alum, received $12 million in funding from the three publishing giants back in September.
Ongo, which promises a “fundamentally new way” of reading news, aggregates news from multiple sources, and includes full content from the Washington Post, and Gannett’s USA Today, as well as selected content from the New York Times and the Financial Times.
News aggregation online has been around for a while, but Ongo also maintains an editorial staff to cherrypick and promote important or interesting stories.
“Our smart tools ensure that readers get the news they need while our editorial team spotlights the interesting, informative and entertaining stories that shouldn’t be missed,” said Kazim in a statement.
News from other papers such as the Charlotte Observer, Detroit Free Press, and Kansas City Star must be added a la carte style, starting at 99 cents.
With newspaper subscription revenue on the decline, and a slew of news content available for free online, publishers have been scrambling to come up with a new way to make money. The Financial Times currently restricts online news stories behind a pay wall, and the New York Times is expected to follow suit.
Whether users will subscribe to what amounts to a paid version of Google News remains to be seen, but Ongo is hoping that built-in article sharing incentives, free “day passes,” and free one month trial subscriptions will bring them in the door.
Are you loyal to your local newspaper? Or do you get your daily dose of news from news aggregators online? Maybe you find out the latest gossip through your Twitter feed? There are a seemingly limitless number of ways to get the news you crave both on- and off-line, with mainstream media in heated competition with its new and social counterpart. In order to remain profitable and still compete online, The Times – a UK-based daily newspaper – was the first of its kind to move content behind a paywall a few weeks ago. Looking at its current readership and number of subscribers, we can safely say that people will pay for news online… up to a point. Would you?
Read more
