Why doesn't Slashdot create a working relationship with them? (e.g. actually pay an original content provider money for their work). More and more newspapers are likely to put barriers to their content, so Slashdot will in turn offer links to fewer and fewer sources, reducing their value (and relevance) in the process.
Where is the crime here? Slashdot has benefitted from the work of others without payment. If Slashdot is a serious business, then they should see the writing on the wall, and begin establishing long-term relationships with quality content producers. And in turn, they should offer subscription services to their audience. Sounds like an honest and valuable service to offer.
I just do not understand why so many people working online have an aversion to exchanging money in return for legitimate services. (Who among us do not expect a paycheck for our work? Or do not expect to pay for information products in the offline world: books, magazines, newspapers, movies, music, research, directory service, ...?)
If it is all about the "free flow of information", why don't newsstands offer magazines for free? After all, most are supported by advertisement and those unsold will go to the trash heap. ("And wow, think of the foot traffic"). Following this logic, I think universities should stop charging for tuition too, as information is free and knowledge is something you can give away without losing.
Perhaps we could have advertising supported online degree programs from the best universities? Or ad supported books, where is the outcry over this? Those greedy book publishers... All those books sitting on store shelves waiting for the public to read them, but alas you have to pay to read. I guess capitalism is criminal in the online world.
The New York Times is okay, because they've got a lot of high-quality stories and they were essentially grandfathered in;
Other registration-required sites are not okay, and we won't post stories linking to them.
Kind of a shame, because the LA Times has some good content too, and we've posted lot of links to them in the past, before they went registration-required. Oh well."
Here's the link to the whole post: http://slashdot.org/articles/02/06/30/0259218.shtml?tid=149
Slashdot is so influential that it has given its name to a behavior, "The Slashdot Effect": The spontaneous high hit rate upon a web server due to an announcement on a high volume news web site.
