While the world waits for how and where the New York Times manages the paywall, the data gives an early view of the year that lies ahead.

Important Details: The New York Times has been in the news with its decision to move to paid content online (see Insights 29 January 2010,Metering: The First 2010 Test of Paid News Content). The world is watching to see if we'll have another TimesSelect on our hands, and, if not, how the paper will navigate the decisions it's making this coming year and wondering why it'll take a year to move ahead.

To affect our own view, we began looking at specific data gathered from our annual News User study, and recently wrote about paid content being an uphill battle for consumers in general (see Insights 24 February 2010, The Paid Content Dilemma - Another Study Confirms). This week we look specifically at data from 2400 respondents across the US and their answers to the question: "Please rank the five news sources that you consider most trustworthy and credible by marking those sources 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th".

The data above show the roll-up of all the top 5 rankings, so the percents here mean that x% ranked a brand in the top (e.g. 52% ranked CNN in the top 5.) Alternatively if we look across each category and apply a weighting to the rank (1^st place - 5, 2^nd place = 4 and tally results within each ranking the order is identical: CNN, AP, Fox News, MSNBC, and ABC News. New York Times was ranked sixth overall followed by Yahoo! News (a free source).Separately, in the same study 2% of the respondents indicated plans to discontinue print subscriptions to the paper; 7% already had. While the drop is slowing, the data show it's not over, another factor impacting paid-content decisions.Implications: There is no dispute that NYT is an incredible brand with strong footprint. However, in Outsell's opinion, it's going to be very difficult for the property to manage paid content with several forces converging:

• the 'training' publishers have given the market that digital news is free;
• the disinclination for consumers to pay based on several studies, our own included;
• the amount of content that is out there free; and
• NY Times' position in the playing field.

It is simply coming from a weaker position when ranked by consumers against other news organizations, most of whose content is available for free. It is also, quite bluntly, facing an oncoming onslaught from Dow Jones, whose parent company has been actively investing in its battle against NYT. The New York Times is not the Wall Street Journal and it's not the FT. It provides specialty content - and some excellent business news content, like the FT and the Journal -- but overall there's doubt as to whether it's special enough. It is still largely a national paper with great focus on its country's most critical region and city. It has good international coverage. But we believe it's not differentiated enough to fight the forces we describe above. In Outsell affiliate Ken Doctor's book Newsonomics he cites 12 rules that will shape the news we consume. One is The Digital Dozen will Dominate.

The NYT is in Ken's Digital Dozen. In Outsell's opinion, there is strong likelihood that, in 10 years, that digital dozen could well be made up of a different group of players or consolidate into "the big 3" of news, just as many other industries that have seen greater concentration of market share over time, given market commodity pressures. While this author is not placing bets (yet) on who shapes the list in the coming decade, the reality is that New York Times will have to manage the paid content move incredibly well, be prepared to win market share and invest, or risk taking two steps back in its attempt to move one forward. It has a year to get it right.

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