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Leave it to a Bezos-owned company to confuse customers and mislead them for profit. (lemmy.world)
submitted 1 year ago by to c/assholedesign@lemmy.world
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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/35308060

Misleading pricing:

Using the billing period as the header and showing the price for the billing period... except for monthly—which shows 1/4 the price and says "every week" in smaller, gray text.

Punishing non-subscription payments:

Adding a $6.50 (1400%) surcharge for wanting a weekly one-time payment instead of a recurring subscription.

Charging more for longer periods:

Monthly billing, once you remove the dark pattern and convert it to its actual price, is $2. There are 12 months in a year, meaning it would cost $24 to maintain that subscription for a year.

Why is the yearly subscription $29, then?

If you want to verify this for yourself, you're going to need to clear your cookies and reload an article a lot. They do A/B tests and show different subscription requied modals. This one was the worst.

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[–] 1 point 1 year ago (2 children)

Yes I know Bezos owns Wapo. That’s why I don’t read it anymore.

Do you think it’s his personal charity? I doubt it! Even if he doesn’t need the money he’ll see it as a matter of pride to make the paper profitable. Anything otherwise would be like a gardener letting all his plants die: embarrassing.

Economics 101: if you charge a trillion dollars for a newspaper and nobody buys it, your profit is zero. If you give your paper away for free and everyone in the world accepts a free copy, your profit is also zero. Somewhere in between the two extremes is a price where profit is maximized. This is the equilibrium or market-clearing price since either raising or lowering the price from this point will reduce profits.

Again, maybe you don’t understand, but $7 < $26 < $29. If you only need the paper for 1 day (or anywhere up to 1 week), it’s cheaper to pay $7 for the 1 week subscription than it is to pay $26 (50 cents per week) for the whole year. There is no option to pay 50 cents for one week and then cancel it.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago (1 child)

    The price for one week of access is 50 cents. They are charging $7 for it. They are charging the price of three and a half months for 1 week of access. Even if that's better than paying $26 for a service you only use for 1 week, it's not good.

    Okay? Read that again. Especially that last part. Now read it again. "Better does not mean good." Are you understanding that? I'm sick of saying it, so if you don't get it, just keep reading it.

    There is no option to pay 50 cents for a week and cancel it. That's a problem. You also imply there's no option to pay $2 for a month and cancel it. Which is weird for a monthly payment option.

    Now, do you want to keep explaining how economics works if you're not greedy and stupid in the naive belief that Wapo execs aren't greedy and stupid? As if they aren't akin to a farmer who loses a cow, so they milk the remaining cow twice as much? Or do you want to move on with your life?

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