As promised, the Sun-Sentinel unveiled its new paywall ("digital memberships") system yesterday, and starting right now, if you don't pay up, you're limited to 15 articles per month.
One big question that's been answered is whether the paywall would be porous -- if links from social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter would count toward a reader's 15-article limit. The answer? Yes, they will.
A quick test of the paywall reveals that it will indeed stop you after 15 articles, even if you click on links from other sources.
The other big question was cost. It'll be $9.99 every five weeks, or a little under $104 per year, to keep reading Sun-Sentinel articles, though current print-edition subscribers get it for free.
Compared to other paywalls, it's quite cheap, but it's infinity percent more expensive than the other local news sources. Here's how it stacks up:
The L.A. Times and Boston Globe both charge $3.99 per week, making them more expensive than the New York Times by around $12 a year. The Baltimore Sun is a Tribune paper with a more comparable circulation, and it charges 2.49 a week. The Sun-Sentinel, by comparison, charges $2. We'll have to wait and see if its readers will pay.
