As more tech oriented blogs look to expand their revenue base in light of weakening advertising dollars some are experimenting with specialized services for a subscription fee. GigaOM was among the first to go this route with their GigaOM Pro service which provided members with specialized market research papers.
Today Ars Technica is following in those footsteps with their just announced Ars Premier subscription service . For the $50.00 per year you will have access to
- subscriber specific content which will include news, analysis, interviews and in-depth technical articles.
- moderated live discussions with Ars editors and industry players
- full access to the Ars Technica PDF library
- membership in the Ars Editorial Roundtable where you will be able to discuss, refine and propose ideas for the editorial and community aspects of the site.
- special forum features including subscriber only titles
- banner free browsing of the Ars Technica site
- subscriber only access to full text RSS feeds
- promos, specials events and discounts.
As with GigaOM it will be interesting to see how this develops and if more tech related blogs will try and follow suit.
