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On average, 55% of the visitors to locally oriented news and information Web sites are neither local nor loyal, but instead are readers from outside of the market and “fly-bys” unlikely to return frequently, according to a new study from Borrell Associates. More here.
The US Government has yet again shuttered several domain names this week. The Department of Justice and Homeland Security’s ICE office proudly announced that they had seized domains related to counterfeit goods and child pornography. What they failed to mention, however, is that one of the targeted domains belongs to a free DNS provider, and that 84,000 websites were wrongfully accused of links to child pornography crimes. More here.
Not one to let a moment pass, Google has rolled out its own subscription plan, presumably in response to Apple’s announcement on Tuesday. The salient points its offering are this: the split with publishers is 90%-10%, as opposed to Apple’s take of 30%. Furthermore, Google is making it as easy as possible to share customer data with publishers. Apple has softened its stance only slightly on this subject, but still requires an opt-in from customers, not many of which are likely to do as they make a purchase. More here and this story and this story.
