
This chart by Michael DeGusta says nearly everything that needs to be said about the Times' new plan to make you pay for it online. (Well aside from the fact that the NYT paywall is needlessly complicated, to boot.)
You can buy a year of the Wall Street Journal, Netflix, Pandora and Dropbox storage for the price of a subscription to the NYT that'll let you read it on all your devices. That's ridiculous. People will pay for the Times—they won't be pillaged for it. And that's why, no matter how many Twitter feeds or other loopholes it shuts down, the current paywall system will fail. [The Understatement via Daring Fireball]
DISCUSSION
From the NYTimes itself:
NYTimes.com + Smartphone App:* $3.75 per week (billed every 4 weeks at $15.00)
Unlimited access to NYTimes.com from any computer or device
Unlimited access to the NYTimes app for BlackBerry, iPhone and Android-powered phones
My calculator tells me that $3.75x52=$195
The $455 figure comes from the following:
All Digital Access:* $8.75 per week (billed every 4 weeks at $35.00)
Unlimited access to NYTimes.com, plus smartphone apps and tablet apps
Unlimited access to NYTimes.com from any computer or device
Unlimited access to the NYTimes app for BlackBerry, iPhone and Android-powered phones
Unlimited access to the NYTimes app for iPad, plus Times Reader 2.0 and the NYTimes app for the Chrome Web Store