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Free access to Autosport Plus until 13th October


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#1 Grayson

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Posted 06 October 2015 - 14:49

Those of you who receive our weekly newsletter will have seen the following message from our editor:

 
 

To celebrate the successful launch of our new beta site, we have made access to beta.autosport.com free and unlimited for one week from today, courtesy of our launch partner Esso Synergy. This means you will be able to read everything on the site - including Autosport Plus articles and an unlimited number of news stories - free of charge with no sign-up of any type required around Formula 1's Russian Grand Prix. We hope this gives you a chance to sample some areas of our coverage you are not yet familiar with, and allows you a better chance to fully experience the first iteration of changes we are making as part of the rebuild process for autosport.com. Once the free period is up next week, you can continue to get unlimited access to our site - including no adverts - if you choose to become an Autosport Plus member.

 
As well as giving our non-members a chance to see the sort of feature content which we've been publishing as part of Autosport Plus, I hope that this is also a good opportunity to take a good look at our the new version of Autosport.com.

 

If you haven't already, please take the time to leave us some feedback (through the red "Feedback" button on the right hand side of the site). We've been hugely grateful for the huge amount of feedback which we've received over the past few weeks and we've already made quite a lot of changes to the site off the back of this!



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#2 slideways

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Posted 07 October 2015 - 05:11

My feedback is that as a paying customer this entire 'upgrade' has been an absolute disgrace and as a direct result of it I am cancelling my subscription as of today. 



#3 Jejking

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Posted 08 October 2015 - 07:58

My feedback is that as a paying customer this entire 'upgrade' has been an absolute disgrace and as a direct result of it I am cancelling my subscription as of today. 

Why is that exactly?



#4 afsartori

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Posted 08 October 2015 - 16:11

Those of you who receive our weekly newsletter will have seen the following message from our editor:

 
 

 
As well as giving our non-members a chance to see the sort of feature content which we've been publishing as part of Autosport Plus, I hope that this is also a good opportunity to take a good look at our the new version of Autosport.com.

 

If you haven't already, please take the time to leave us some feedback (through the red "Feedback" button on the right hand side of the site). We've been hugely grateful for the huge amount of feedback which we've received over the past few weeks and we've already made quite a lot of changes to the site off the back of this!

 

I want my money back. I paid 59 € in March for an annual Autosport+ subscription, and soon after, you released a promotion offering free access to premium content. And now, you are being sponsored by Esso. I deserve at least part of my money back! The payment was totally unnecessary.

 

Sincerely,

me.


Edited by afsartori, 08 October 2015 - 16:11.


#5 HoldenRT

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Posted 09 October 2015 - 09:32

I've had free access and can't even bring myself to read a single article.  I've tried and there is just nothing of interest.

 

Even if there was, I don't understand what others do.. for example whether or not I read it.. how that would affect your enjoyment of the articles.  Is this sort of like how vegetarians get offended when anyone eats meat?  They want everyone to not eat meat?

 

For me personally, I'd gladly sacrifice that.. and have others eat for free while I pay.. as long as I could enjoy the bloody races or articles.

 

Appreciate the gesture from autosport either way.  I just wish there were something interesting happening in F1 worth reading or writing about.  It's all so blah.



#6 Grayson

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Posted 12 October 2015 - 10:22

I want my money back. I paid 59 € in March for an annual Autosport+ subscription, and soon after, you released a promotion offering free access to premium content. And now, you are being sponsored by Esso. I deserve at least part of my money back! The payment was totally unnecessary.

 

There are other benefits to being an Autosport Plus member, including an ad-free site (which means that you won't be seeing much of that Esso sponsorship if you're logged in), access to Forix and early access to our Beta through the summer. Not to mention the warm, fuzzy feeling that you get when you know that you're supporting quality motorsport journalism. That said, if you feel strongly about this then I would be happy to extend your subscription by a week. Drop me a private message with your Autosport Plus username and I'll get on that right away.

 

For anyone who hasn't previously been an Autosport Plus member, but who would be interested in viewing a bit more of our free content over the next couple of days, I thought it was worth highlighting a couple of features which have gone up on the site this morning. After a Grand Prix, our race report and our driver ratings are usually some of our most popular features:

 

 


#7 afsartori

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Posted 12 October 2015 - 12:15

 

There are other benefits to being an Autosport Plus member, including an ad-free site (which means that you won't be seeing much of that Esso sponsorship if you're logged in), access to Forix and early access to our Beta through the summer. Not to mention the warm, fuzzy feeling that you get when you know that you're supporting quality motorsport journalism. That said, if you feel strongly about this then I would be happy to extend your subscription by a week. Drop me a private message with your Autosport Plus username and I'll get on that right away.

 

For anyone who hasn't previously been an Autosport Plus member, but who would be interested in viewing a bit more of our free content over the next couple of days, I thought it was worth highlighting a couple of features which have gone up on the site this morning. After a Grand Prix, our race report and our driver ratings are usually some of our most popular features:

 

 

 

 

What I think is that, when you release free access to premium content, everybody paying for premium content should automatically gain an extension of their premium membership, because otherwise it's totally unfair. If something is free, it should be free for everybody. Very likely I wouldn't have been tempted to pay for premium membership if I had gained a week of free premium content and seen that it's not *that* beneficial after all. Oops! Now you know. It doesn't make that much difference, honestly. At least for me. Most of the relevant content is the content which is already free. It would be much more interesting, though, if we could interact with other members and with the journalists at every article page, as I suggested here: http://forums.autosp...r-each-article/ It would make more sense than this Forum.

 

Every premium member should be given a week prolongation of their membership, not only me.



#8 Allan Lupton

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Posted 12 October 2015 - 13:50

Thanks for the links, Grayson, and I suppose I shouldn't have expected much more the day after a typical bumping and boring F1 race, but pretty uninspiring stuff.

I hoped for better when I saw

Getting inside Honda's F1 power unit

as I have always found technical information difficult to find.

However that headline was nothing to do with the article which told us a little about the outside of that engine and then went on to Mercedes and Toro Rosso.


Edited by Allan Lupton, 12 October 2015 - 13:50.


#9 Imperial

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Posted 21 October 2015 - 08:34

What I think is that, when you release free access to premium content, everybody paying for premium content should automatically gain an extension of their premium membership, because otherwise it's totally unfair. If something is free, it should be free for everybody. Very likely I wouldn't have been tempted to pay for premium membership if I had gained a week of free premium content and seen that it's not *that* beneficial after all. Oops! Now you know. It doesn't make that much difference, honestly. At least for me. Most of the relevant content is the content which is already free. It would be much more interesting, though, if we could interact with other members and with the journalists at every article page, as I suggested here: http://forums.autosp...r-each-article/ It would make more sense than this Forum.

Every premium member should be given a week prolongation of their membership, not only me.


To be fair, those of us who have been subscribers to the print edition for years could cancel and resubscribe every year to claim the free gift, but I personally could not be bothered.

Is it really that bad for them to run a one week promotion? If it results in more subscribers, in the long run it can only keep the costs down for everyone. Be careful what you wish for you know.

#10 afsartori

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Posted 21 October 2015 - 12:57

To be fair, those of us who have been subscribers to the print edition for years could cancel and resubscribe every year to claim the free gift, but I personally could not be bothered.

Is it really that bad for them to run a one week promotion? If it results in more subscribers, in the long run it can only keep the costs down for everyone. Be careful what you wish for you know.

 

Nobody is asking them to stop making promotions. I'm just asking for fairness. If they want to give free access to anyone for a week, also those who are paying for it should get a week access for free as well. That's all. They manage to attract new subscribers after that and keep a good relationship with their current subscribers.