An interesting variation on the patronage model

Ever since copying and storing bits became virtually free, there’s been a lot discussion about various ways “content creators” (writers, artists, musicians, etc.) might earn a living: per-copy sales, advertising, patronage, etc.

Felix Salmon’s recent piece on How the New Yorker monetizes old content is an interesting contribution to the discussion.

Apparently, the New Yorker is producing ebooks, drawing from their vast library of articles by great writers. The ebooks are paid for by a corporate sponsor, and then made available free to electronic subscribers and cheap to non-subscribers.

Now, on the one hand, having content paid for by selling advertising to sponsors is one of the standard models. But this is a little different. The things are cheap to produce (no printing costs) and cheap to market (free to subscribers, making them more willing to pay for their subscription). The New Yorker only needs to find one corporate sponsor—presumably a small task, compared to the regular job of their sales department.

I wouldn’t be surprised to see the model spread into speculative fiction. I can definitely see sf&f magazines finding sponsors willing to cover most of the cost of editing and the acquisition of reprint rights (all pretty cheap). Making the anthology ebooks free to the subscribers of their electronic editions would make the subscriptions more valuable, and making them available cheap for non-subscribers would be great advertising for both the magazine and the sponsor.

I’m always glad to see any new source of money for writers, and any new channel for getting old stories in front of new readers.