The Boston Globe adds an option that puts it one step closer (maybe) to sharing on social media
This past November I wrote about how a Boston Globe subscriber could share a gift link with a non-subscriber via email. It was strictly a one-to-one feature — there was no authorized way of sending a gift link to a social-media platform. (There are unauthorized ways, which I’ll let you figure out.)
Within the past day or so, though, a new item suddenly popped up on the Globe’s sharing options called “Gift an Article.” My hope was that the Globe had joined multiple other papers and was now offering a few free gift shares a month that would work anywhere, not just through email.
With great anticipation, I clicked. And I was greeted with a text-entry box that said “Gift This Article Through Email.” The rest of the sharing features — Facebook, Bluesky, etc. — give you a link that lead to a paywall when a non-subscriber clicks on them.
Oh, well. I’ll be optimistic and hope that this is the first step toward a real sharing feature.
Related Knowledge Center: State of the business model
The traditional journalism business model has long since collapsed, and news organizations have shrunk or disappeared entirely. While a number of promising experiments are under way, the public has not shown a willingness to buy what news organizations are selling.