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CNN to try a news paywall next month

The most-visited news site in the US is trialing a subscription model

This just in… next month, CNN will start experimenting with breaking some news to paid subscribers exclusively. As reported by The New York Times, the network is trialing a “metered” paywall on its website from early October, which will see frequent readers charged for digital access after reaching a set article limit.

Following in the footsteps of paywalled publishers like the NYTimes itself, the planned subscription model will bring about a major shift in how ~440 million monthly users — 4x the number of visitors that the Washington Post garnered in August, per Similarweb data — are able to interact with content at the most-visited news site in the US.

The move comes as part of CEO Mark Thompson’s plan to restructure the organization, which saw 100 employees laid off in July. This follows a years-long viewership decline at its cable news arm, previously the center of the company’s multimedia empire.

While CNN is still one of America’s most popular cable news channels, cable TV is being superseded by the rise of streaming and social media, where a growing proportion of Americans now get their news from.

Nearly a third of cable subscribers have cut the cord over the past four years, and, in 2023, cable and broadcast made up less than half of TV viewing for the first time ever.

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Apple TV dropped the “plus” as streamers keep pulling back on originals

After the spray-and-pray approach led to a wave of cancellations, Hollywood is settling into an era of just making fewer shows.

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The average price of a new vehicle in the US passed $50,000 for the first time ever in September

The average price of a new vehicle in the US surpassed $50,000 in September, according to Cox Automotive’s Kelley Blue Book.

At $50,080, that’s the highest industry average ever, reflecting the price hikes faced by new car buyers in recent years amid pandemic supply shortages, tariff-induced increases, and the high cost of EV production. The figure marks a 3.6% jump from the same month last year.

“Tariffs have introduced new cost pressure to the business, but the pricing story in September was mostly driven by the healthy mix of EVs and higher-end vehicles pushing the new-vehicle ATP into uncharted territory,” Cox executive analyst Erin Keating said. Passing the $50,000 mark was inevitable, Keating said, especially considering that the country’s bestseller is a Ford truck that “routinely costs north of $65,000.”

Year over year, new vehicle prices rose nearly 6% for GM, while Ford’s climbed 2.5%. Volkswagen new prices were up 12.5%.

As prices climb, so do delinquencies on loans to borrowers with lower credit scores. Recent data from Fitch Ratings shows the portion of subprime US auto loans 60 days or more overdue reached 6.43% in August.

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Nia Warfield

Alibaba slides as the e-commerce giant’s cloud arm reportedly plans to slash overseas prices

Alibaba slipped more than 3% Tuesday morning following reports that its cloud unit will cut prices of select Elastic Compute Service products by up to 10.2% in overseas markets including Frankfurt, Tokyo, and Dubai.

The cuts, effective October 30, reflect the company’s push to expand its global footprint. The moves reflect a more targeted regional approach for the company as it seeks to strengthen its footprint in Europe and Asia. Alibaba Cloud made similar price cuts on international cloud products last year.

Competition is hot: Alibaba Cloud sits behind behemoths Amazon, Microsoft, and Google in the global cloud race, coming in fourth worldwide, according to data from Gartner.

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