Sports Illustrated online charging for premium content

Computerworld - Earlier this week, SI.com, the online version of Sports Illustrated magazine, made some of its most popular online features, columnists and stories available only to paid subscribers of its print magazine.
The Web site has never carried all of the content from the print magazine, said Steve Robinson, managing editor of SI.com, but it has included some of its most popular writers and features. Now, premium content, including columns by Rick Reilly and Steve Rushin, as well as sports beat coverage from reporters including Peter King and Tom Verducci, will be available online only with a paid print subscription.
The free site will remain, Robinson said, and it will continue to include original content not usually found in the magazine. Subscribers of the print edition, however, will be able to see more of the weekly print edition appearing online a couple of days before the issues show up in their mailboxes, he said.
Sports Illustrated print subscribers will be able to log into the special area of the Web site, called SI Exclusive, by entering their subscriber numbers. Nonsubscribers can buy a subscription to the magazine online and gain immediate access to the exclusive content.
The new SI Exclusive section launched on Sept. 9, and while little feedback has been received so far, "the traffic's been good" on the site, Robinson said.
"We're going to build on it" by adding additional content and features in the future, he said.
The reason for the change, Robinson said, is to help cement the relationship between the print and online versions of the publication for readers. The Web site has been under the CNN.com banner since July 1997, and SI.com was launched on its own earlier this year and underwent a site redesign in last month, he said. Circulation of the print edition is about 3.2 million, but online visitor figures aren't released.
Subscribers can expect additional content from SI Exclusive, including a weekend preview section, large-image photo galleries and pictures from the past few years of Sports Illustrated's swimsuit issue. Two of the magazine's most popular sections, SI Adventure and Golf Plus, will also be available online exclusively to Sports Illustrated subscribers.
Analysts say the move will have to be watched to gauge its success.
"This is a model that content providers -- many of which were merely newspaper and magazine publishers a few years ago -- can understand and explain to their colleagues in their companies' financial departments," said Michael Dortch, an analyst at Robert Frances Group Inc. in Westport, Conn.