Product

Newsletters, Publishing and the Future of Web3

Exploring NFT subscription models

You may have heard of NFTs. You may even know that NFT stands for Non-fungible token. Most of the hype around these digital assets is in the digital art market, but Time Magazine, The New York Times and others have sold NFTs of their articles and photographs.

The New York Times Buy This Column in the Blockchain! originally sold for 350 Ether, which is around $1.5 Million dollars at the time this description is being written. The Associated Press’s collection of 24,000 Unique Moments NFTs sold out in just over one minute! The demand from collectors is there. This project seeks to explore how NFT digital assets can leverage assets from other types of news organizations: quite literally proving the value of journalism. There’s a lot to be excited about here.

The NFT space has been shifting towards membership and utility and away from static artworks. This disruptive technology is proving to disrupt just about anything that can be considered a digital asset. There is a lot of potential in memberships for the news and media industry. Media heavyweights like YouTube, Twitter and even Coachella are finding ways to use NFTs to prove membership or subscriptions for their holders.

For subscriptions, we’re excited by the idea is that no one ever has to “cancel” their subscription. They can just sell it to someone else and the royalties can go towards funding the publication. A fixed supply of subscriptions can allow a publication to focus on a set number of subscribers and have a narrow focused subject area (niche) while maintaining a sustainable business model.

For this project, we will work towards launching a botique publication that is delivered to NFT holders. The team will decide on the topic, prototype and launch the publication. There is room for reporters, developers, designers and those interested in business models on this project.

Faculty and Staff Leads

Zach Wise

Professor, Journalism

Emmy winning interactive producer & Associate Professor @NorthwesternU, @KnightLab. Formerly of The New York Times. Creator of TimelineJS & StoryMapJS

Project Details

2022 Spring
Newsletters, Publishing and the Future of Web3

Description

You may have heard of NFTs. You may even know that NFT stands for Non-fungible token. Most of the hype around these digital assets is in the digital art market, but Time Magazine, The New York Times and others have sold NFTs of their articles and photographs. The New York Times Buy This Column in the Blockchain! originally sold for 350 Ether, which is around $1.5 Million dollars at the time this description is being written. The Associated Press's collection of 24,000 Unique Moments NFTs sold out in just over one minute! The demand from collectors is there. This project seeks to explore how NFT digital assets can leverage assets from other types of news organizations: quite literally proving the value of journalism. There's a lot to be excited about here.

The NFT space has been shifting towards membership and utility and away from static artworks. This disruptive technology is proving to disrupt just about anything that can be considered a digital asset. There is a lot of potential in memberships for the news and media industry. Media heavyweights like YouTube, Twitter and even Coachella are finding ways to use NFTs to prove membership or subscriptions for their holders.

For subscriptions, we're excited by the idea is that no one ever has to "cancel" their subscription. They can just sell it to someone else and the royalties can go towards funding the publication. A fixed supply of subscriptions can allow a publication to focus on a set number of subscribers and have a narrow focused subject area (niche) while maintaining a sustainable business model.

For this project, we will work towards launching a botique publication that is delivered to NFT holders. The team will decide on the topic, prototype and launch the publication. There is room for reporters, developers, designers and those interested in business models on this project.

Important Questions
  • What topics and how specific should a publication be that caters to a fixed size membership?
  • What are the economic considerations of a fixed supply membership?
  • How much does the delivery mechanism matter in this new space?
  • What voice and what quantity of reporting proves to be valuable to holders when they essentially own a slice of readership?
  • How important is reader engagement when they own a piece of the readership?
Outcome

For this project, we will work towards launching a botique publication that is delivered to NFT holders. The team will decide on the topic, prototype and launch the publication. There is room for reporters, developers, designers and those interested in business models on this project.

2022 Fall
Publishing and the Future of Web3 Community Membership

Description

You may have heard of NFTs. You may even know that NFT stands for Non-fungible token. Most of the hype around these digital assets is in the digital art market, but Time Magazine, The New York Times and others have sold NFTs of their articles and photographs. The New York Times Buy This Column in the Blockchain! originally sold for 350 Ether, which is around $1.5 Million dollars at the time this description is being written. The Associated Press's collection of 24,000 Unique Moments NFTs sold out in just over one minute! The demand from collectors is there. This project seeks to explore how NFT digital assets can leverage assets from other types of news organizations: quite literally proving the value of journalism. There's a lot to be excited about here.

The NFT space has been shifting towards membership and utility and away from static artworks. This disruptive technology is proving to disrupt just about anything that can be considered a digital asset. There is a lot of potential in memberships for the news and media industry. Media heavyweights like YouTube, Twitter and even Coachella are finding ways to use NFTs to prove membership or subscriptions for their holders.

For subscriptions, we're excited by the idea is that no one ever has to "cancel" their subscription. They can just sell it to someone else and the royalties can go towards funding the publication. A fixed supply of subscriptions can allow a publication to focus on a set number of subscribers and have a narrow focused subject area (niche) while maintaining a sustainable business model.

For this project, we will build off the progress of the Spring 2022 iteration. The value proposition is focused on subscription as not only a service but also membership into a community including access to knowledge holders. There is room for reporters, developers, designers and those interested in business models on this project.

Important Questions
  • What topics and how specific should a publication be that caters to a fixed size membership?
  • What modes of interaction with the community and experts work well in this model?
  • What are the economic considerations of a fixed supply membership?
  • How much does the delivery mechanism matter in this new space?
  • Does membership alone carry value? If so, how much?
  • What voice and what quantity of reporting proves to be valuable to holders when they essentially own a slice of readership?
Outcome

For this project, we will build off the progress of the Spring 2022 iteration. The value proposition is focused on subscription as not only a service but also membership into a community including access to knowledge holders. There is room for reporters, developers, designers and those interested in business models on this project.