Cape Cod Wave Magazine will soon be putting all of our Longform stories behind a paywall. We expect to have three simple prices.
- By the story, access for one month – $3
- Annually – Access to all stories written during the year PLUS access to all previously published Longform stories $50 a year
- all access for $5 a month
WHY ARE WE DOING THIS?
Recently, while researching the economic system of capitalism, we learned that people often charge money for a product that they produce. This was a revelation.
The truth is we have never thought of this as a business. It is journalism. A good cause. We want to tell interesting important stories about the people and issues of Cape Cod. We cover the character and culture of this amazing peninsula.
Along the way, we have produced more than 120 longform stories that we never made any money on. These stories were labor intensive, sometimes taking a month or longer to research and write. They range from 2,000 words to 10,000 words long.
As you can maybe tell, we are not exactly on a publishing schedule. Our motto is that we’d rather be good than fast. After all, those stories, many of them evergreen, are still relevant, whether a profile of a surfer, musician or politician, or a deep dive into a long-running issue such as housing or our changing environment.
Our list of longform stories over the past 11 years is long and varied and from all over the Cape. Among our many profiles of interesting and important Cape Codders are stories about a retiring beloved librarian, an astronaut with local roots, and filmmaker John Waters’ book about hitchhiking across America at 66 years old. There are also stories about two Falmouth men who fought successfully against the installation of industrial-sized wind turbines in their neighborhood, a Zelig-like photographer, and a good-hearted housing matchmaker in Provincetown.
We do more than just profiles. For instance, we dove into the rising price of fried clams, investigated Falmouth’s most notorious crime, and explored whether a grand jury would indict a ham sandwich. We have even examined the decaying state of local journalism on Cape Cod.
We are proud of those stories and of the work we put in to create them. It’s what we do. We are intent on creating great content.
Here is a link to all of our longform stories.
But… ah, yes, there’s always a but…, this can’t continue without revenue. The time has come. The concept, that people will actually read long stories on the Internet, has been proven. We need to earn some money for this work.
So starting shortly, Cape Cod Wave will be putting all of our longform stories behind a paywall.
All of our other stories – slideshows and music videos – will remain free to all. We will show you the first 300 words of our Longform story before you hit the paywall, where you will be given a choice of buying access to one story for one month, or buying a monthly subscription, or yearly subscription.
Thank you for reading all these years. We hope you continue. And we hope you understand our reason for this change.
If you like this magazine, please spread the word.
— Laura & Brian
