LTS: Working at the first newspaper to charge readers in Vietnam, journalist Tran Tien Duan, Editor-in-Chief of VietnamPlus e-newspaper said that charging readers is a trend of the world’s press. To collect fees effectively, newsrooms must orient the production of content for paying readers that specialize in specific areas and must make a worthy investment to improve the quality of articles. Big, hot issues are at the forefront. VietNamNet would like to introduce the following article of Mr. For online newspapers, revenue is mainly from advertising and media contracts. However, now, there is a big shift when businesses choose advertising media through social media more instead of advertising on electronic newspapers. The transformation of advertising methods and the reduction of revenue is a really challenging economic problem for newspaper leaders. E-newspapers want to survive and develop, they need to find new forms of journalism economy, in which fee collection can be a solution for electronic newspapers in Vietnam. Editor-in-Chief of VietnamPlus Online Newspaper Tran Tien Duan Fee collection at VietnamPlus e-Newspaper There are many newspapers in the world such as Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post (USA), Financial Times, The Economist (UK), Svenska Dagbladet and Aftonbladet New Media (Sweden), Folha de São Paulo (Brazil). .. had early success with the digital-based fee model, before the growth of online advertising revenue slowed down and even declined in recent years. In addition, a harsh reality that has emerged in recent years is that up to 75-80% of digital advertising revenue flows into the pockets of two giants Google and Facebook. Because of that, newspapers found that they could no longer depend on advertising revenue, so charging readers really became a trend of the world press. On June 20, 2018, VNA’s online newspaper VietnamPlus became the first and only Vietnamese press agency to collect fees for reading content on digital platforms. Every day, VietnamPlus only distributes about 5-10 fee-based articles, including in-depth analysis articles, exclusive interviews, etc., produced by the newsroom itself, or translated under the franchise of major press units. In the world. Because the quantity of news sold is small, it does not affect the provision of essential information to serve readers and still ensures the principles and orientation of the VNA. VietnamPlus is the national foreign affairs electronic newspaper under the VNA. Therefore, the newspaper has many advantages due to the information system of the VNA and from 90 resident agencies at home and abroad. Therefore, VietnamPlus has more advantages when it comes to building specialized and in-depth content for its premium products, creating “commodity” products of high value and use value. Target a wide audience willing to pay to own that unique article or news. Interface of fee collection page of VietnamPlus newspaper The content that VietnamPlus has been collecting fees for focuses on 4 main areas: Politics – society, world, economy – technology and culture – sport. These articles are analyzed from multiple perspectives, and more importantly, have a lot of exclusive information because they are provided quickly, timely, and attractively by resident correspondents abroad. public interest. Regarding access organization, while The Straits Times and other fee-based online newspapers often put both paid and free content on the same website, Vietnam Plus separates the fee to https: //pay.vietnamplus.vn and free at https://vietnamplus.vn. This is to avoid offending readers who are not used to paying for e-newspapers, but will also affect the ability to cross-promote for subscriptions. In the near future, the newsroom is also planning to change it to allow partial reading, creating an incentive for users to be willing to pay. Taking the first step on a new path, VietnamPlus e-newspaper has constantly learned from the electronic newspaper fee models in the world, researched the information needs of domestic readers to build and develop this model. in your own newspaper. Currently, VietnamPlus uses many strategies to achieve its goals: Periodical newsletters, information on specific topics (politics, economics, culture, science) to attract subscribers to target each audience. customers and targeting each specific customer group on Facebook, Google does not use advertising to bring its posted content to potential new customers. Vietnamplus aims to continue to produce high-quality, long-form content such as mega-story, long-form, and not only restrict the content to economic, financial, strategic, and business secrets, but also open it up. other fields such as technology, sports, entertainment, politics, new trends, forecast information… and collect fees from these articles. Some problems raised in electronic newspaper fee collection In the economic activities of journalism, in order to collect fees effectively, newsrooms must orient the production of content for paying readers to specialize in specific areas and must make worthy investments to improve the quality. posts. Big, hot issues come first, otherwise there would be no reason to convince people to subscribe. Because the readers who can afford to pay are often businesses, researchers, press agencies, people with high income and qualifications, they need information from experts, managers, comment on a topics that are important to them. A newsletter from the VietnamPlus e-newspaper Through polling and surveying the groups and individuals that buy information from VietnamPlus, they found that the news sold has a high content of information, going deep into a field or issue that public opinion and society are interested in. Such news they accept to pay for the source of information they are using. Through this, VietnamPlus also determined, selling news must focus on readers, must find a way to determine what their readers need. Readers will spend money when they really believe that they have valuable, quality sources. And the question is: how can we create many “goods” that are attractive enough to users, making them “pickpocket” to pay? Payers buy high-quality content, not cheap. Readers pay for content because it helps them stay informed and post about issues they care about. And readers appreciate the exclusive content they have access to more than ancillary benefits like promotional giveaways when they sign up. Paid readers send a clear signal that news outlets that want growth cannot cut costs. Acquiring a paid audience requires an investment in high-quality content and a focus on meeting the needs of the audience. It is not easy to convince readers to pay when they are used to free information, so VietnamPlus’s pioneering in this field is also to help readers get used to reading paid newspapers. money. Must-know content turns free readers into paying readers. Informative, insightful, specialized content motivates readers to withdraw, which is the key to retaining readers. It is also about turning the habits of readers into our habits, understandable that when readers accept to pay for an information, it means that it is the act of paying for their own habits. Therefore, VietnamPlus e-newspaper also focuses on the habits of its readers. Habits are the best way to increase engagement. In addition, a difficulty in selling news is due to technology limitations. When it was newly built to collect fees, VietnamPlus’s method was still limited to only using mobile phones from a network operator. Currently, payment gateways have been expanded, allowing a variety of other payment methods such as bank cards, e-wallets, QR codes… VietnamPlus is planning to upgrade the payment system. Moreover, the fact that copyright in Vietnam has been a difficult problem to solve for many years. A good article just published in a certain newspaper will immediately be copied in its entirety. If a newspaper has a lock on its special articles and only provides them to paying readers, it is also difficult, because a website that aggregates information only needs to spend a little money to read and ” collage”, then this information will no longer be “poisonous”. Because of these reasons, it is understandable that the trend of charging readers to read e-newspapers in Vietnam is prone to failure right from the start. Collecting money from online readers in Vietnam is very difficult nowadays, but if they want to change the revenue structure, press agencies have to start working. The most important thing is to protect copyright, not to let a good article be cut and pasted by dozens of other websites on your site comfortably. The locking of articles and invitations to buy online newspapers need to be carried out simultaneously in many newspapers to create a positive effect. In 2019, Vietnam’s online advertising revenue was estimated at 648 million USD, of which Facebook accounted for 275 million USD, Google 174.9 million USD, domestic units accounted for only 180.9 million USD.

One theory is that the virus came from a bat-like animal. The virus then passes to another animal that has close contact with humans and infects them. The second theory suspects that the SARS-CoV-2 virus leaked from a chemical laboratory in Wuhan, China – where the first patient with Covid-19 was recorded. This hypothesis has been rejected many times, even by the WHO team of experts who came to Wuhan to investigate and rejected this hypothesis. However, in recent weeks, this question has been dug up again. Both of these hypotheses still have no reasonable answer, creating a controversy among scientists. The focus of public opinion The Wuhan Institute of Virology specializes in the study of pathogens in nature that are capable of infecting humans – causing novel diseases and high mortality. The Institute has collected many samples from wild animals for experiments to assess the vulnerability of humans to a variety of animal viruses. The institute has carried out numerous studies on bat viruses since the 2002 SARS outbreak, which claimed the lives of 774 people worldwide. Years after a strenuous search, scientists discovered a virus similar to the one that causes SARS exists in a bat cave in southwestern China. To reduce the risk of pathogens accidentally escaping, the facility had to enforce a series of stringent procedures, such as protective clothing or air filtration systems. However, even the most stringent measures cannot eliminate the risk of the virus leaking into the environment. Chinese virologist Shi Zhengli of the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Photo: South China Morning Post. For some scientists, the spread of pathogens by a careless laboratory worker is a plausible theory that explains how the pandemic began. The Wuhan Institute of Virology is located right near the Huanan seafood market – the outbreak is considered the most likely to transmit the virus from animals to humans. The location between the two immediately raised suspicions. Many people are even more suspicious in the context that the animal that carries the disease has not been identified and the Chinese government repeatedly refuses to allow the investigation of the scenario that Covid-19 is a leaked product from a laboratory. The scientists developed the hypothesis based on concerns about the risks associated with laboratory research, clues in the virus genome, and information from the institute’s studies. The Wuhan Institute of Virology insists that its laboratory does not have a virus closely related to SARS-CoV-2 – the origin of the Covid-19 outbreak. This hypothesis was repeatedly rejected, and was forgotten for some time. Until May 23, Wall Street Journal Citing a confidential US report, it was revealed that in November 2019, before China reported its first Covid-19 cases, some researchers at the Wuhan Institute of Virology were hospitalized. . Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian stated on May 24 that the article was “completely untrue”. The ability to transmit viruses from animals to humans A larger number of scientists believe that the virus that causes Covid-19 is of natural origin because there is no scientific evidence to support the scenario of a leak from a laboratory. Kristian G Andersen, a scientist at Scripps Research, who has done extensive research on coronaviruses, Ebola and other pathogens transmitted from animals to humans, says similar natural gene sequences are present in viruses as well. corona. Many new diseases in the past originated in bats. Photo: SCMP. In addition, from a historical perspective, a number of new diseases that have emerged in the past century have been traced back to human interactions with wild and domestic animals, including SARS (bats), MERS-CoV. (camels), Ebola (bats or primates) and Nipah viruses (bats). However, under any scenario, there is not enough evidence to prove that the other scenario cannot happen. 24 scientists recently sent a letter to the World Health Organization (WHO) demanding a rigorous, independent investigation, arguing that an international investigation into China in early February was insufficient. deep. US President Joe Biden on May 26 also ordered intelligence forces to “double efforts” to investigate the origin of the Covid-19 pandemic and report the results of the investigation within 90 days.

While the rest of the world struggled to find a way to relax travel restrictions, the two Asian financial centers have been trying for months to open up to tourism. In November 2020, the number of Covid-19 infections in Hong Kong skyrocketed, forcing Singapore and Hong Kong to postpone the “travel bubble”. And now, a new outbreak in Singapore has extinguished hopes of a “travel bubble” once again. “Next time, they should announce the enforcement 24 hours in advance so that Covid-19 does not have time to react,” Wong, 33, joked. The “travel bubble” connecting Singapore and Hong Kong was postponed twice because of the Covid-19 epidemic. Photo: Getty Images. Travel thirst The two city governments carefully drafted detailed criteria and announced new safety regulations to open the border. Many people who want to travel rush to book tickets to secure seats on two scheduled return flights each day. They plan to go to specific places, meet friends. Now again they are disappointed. “Singapore is only a 3.5 hour flight from Hong Kong, but now it feels like the other side of the world.” WSJ quoted Emma Herblot – 42-year-old French expert working for an online payment company in Singapore – lamented. Singapore and Hong Kong have been relatively successful in containing the Covid-19 epidemic and are still applying strict isolation regulations. People returning from anywhere still have to be isolated in concentrated for 2-3 weeks. So many Singaporeans and Hong Kongers have not traveled for more than a year now. Travel blogger Aaron Wong at Changi Airport in February 2020. This is his last trip before the Covid-19 epidemic. Photo: WSJ. Unlike the US or Europe, people stuck in Singapore and Hong Kong don’t have much choice when it comes to commuting. The area of ​​Singapore is only 728 square kilometers, Hong Kong is only slightly larger. Andrew Scott – a 41-year-old editor who works at a Hong Kong media company – said he planned to visit friends in Singapore. “It was fine until around January, I really wanted to go somewhere,” he lamented. I was so excited about the travel bubble plan and then it was all a disappointment.” Last year, Asian tourism experts and officials asserted that the “tourist bubble” was the key to opening the border. They say that two-dimensional “bubbles” will appear first, followed by regional “bubbles”. Some experts envision a giant Asian “travel bubble” consisting of countries that have succeeded in containing the Covid-19 epidemic. The Hong Kong government has used a “travel bubble” to encourage people to get vaccinated in recent weeks. “Great but dull Singapore” Since the beginning of the pandemic, Singapore has recorded more than 61,600 cases of Covid-19 per 5.8 million people and 31 deaths. Meanwhile, Hong Kong recorded 11,800 cases per 7.5 million people and 210 deaths. As the number of infections in Singapore increased, Chitra Karamchandani (30 years old, in Hong Kong) was extremely worried. She has not seen her fiancé for the past 1.5 years because of restrictions on entry to non-citizens. According to the plan, he was supposed to fly to Hong Kong at the end of this month and they will hold a wedding in June. Karamchandani had detailed plans to welcome her fiance, including walking around the city and learning to cook Japanese noodles. The “bubble” burst made her extremely disappointed. “When will the border reopen? We just want to see each other again,” she lamented. Dennison Wee – 26 years old, working in finance in Singapore – hopes his trip to Hong Kong will become an inspiration for him to continue blogging. He has written about journeys through nearly 100 cities around the world. Without a “tourist bubble”, Singaporeans and Hong Kongers are trapped in the city’s small size. Photo: Getty Images. But since March 2020, he has only written a few reviews about hotels within a radius of about 20 km around his apartment. Mr Wee, 26, said: “Singapore is great but it’s dull. We must have only one hill to walk on, a few islands.” To keep himself busy, travel blogger Wong participates in projects to stimulate local tourism. He continued to wait for another 2 weeks until the authorities had a new notice. “All we can do is hope,” Wong said.

The price of Dogecoin plummeted right after the show featuring Elon Musk started. Photo: Coindesk. However, when Musk didn’t show up, the price of Dogecoin plummeted. According to the data of Coinmarketcap , from nearly 0.7 USD, Dogecoin dropped to more than 0.5 USD after more than 30 minutes of the program. The market capitalization of this coin dropped from $90 billion to just $68 billion after 1 hour, more than $150 million of leveraged investors was blown away. As expected by many, Elon Musk mentioned Dogecoin in the middle of the show. “Recently, the prices of many cryptocurrencies have increased, such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, and especially Dogecoin,” replied Elon Musk when asked “what is cryptocurrency”. Elon Musk’s mention of Dogecoin only made the coin rise slightly from the bottom. By 12 o’clock, the price of Dogecoin was still at $ 0.55, a sharp decrease compared to before Saturday Night Live aired. “People seem to be starting to realize that you shouldn’t invest based on a guest on a comedy show mentioning that asset,” said Wall Street Journal financial writer Paul Vigna. Elon Musk appeared on Saturday Night Live, mentioning Dogecoin. Earlier, the news that Elon Musk led Saturday Night Live caused the price of Dogecoin to increase sharply. According to the data of Coinmarketcap , the value of each Dogecoin has increased from $0.34 on May 1 to $0.69 as of the morning of May 8. Many fans of Musk and Dogecoin even plan to invite friends over to watch and celebrate if the coin’s price skyrockets. On the morning of May 8, Elon Musk posted on his personal Twitter a picture of him and two other guests of Saturday Night Live. Musk also inserted a picture of the dog Shibu, the symbol of Dogecoin, into the frame. Soon after, the Dogecoin price increased rapidly and reached an all-time high of $0.72 before cooling off.

People are vaccinated against COVID-19 by Johnson & Johnson Company in Chicago, Illinois, USA on April 6, 2021. Photo: AFP/VNA New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio recently announced the city will offer COVID-19 vaccination services to foreign visitors at mobile vaccination centers, starting this summer. But before that time, tourists, mostly Mexicans, have flocked to the US for the opportunity to get vaccinated. Up to now, tens of thousands of tourists from Mexico and some other countries have “landed” in many states such as Texas and Florida to be vaccinated. Some states in the US, including Texas, do not require visitors to present proof of residency. USA Today previously reported that thousands of wealthy tourists, including politicians, TV stars, leaders of companies and corporations in Latin America, have traveled to the US to receive vaccines. Some rent a private jet to go to the US. Mexico has so far only vaccinated enough doses for about 6% of the population and the vaccination program is only applicable to people over 60 years old. Many tour operators in Mexico have promoted travel packages including vaccinations to the US. “Enjoy Dallas and get a COVID-19 vaccine,” a travel agency ran an ad. Mexican airlines also recently increased flights to south Texas to serve the growing demand of travelers. A Thai travel company is also offering a package “COVID-19 vaccine tour” to the US. More than 200 people are already booked, at a cost of $2,400 per person for a 10-day trip to California that includes a single dose of Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine. The above amount does not include the cost of airfare.

Notably, Jess does not go to the store to hunt for concert tickets or wait to buy new exclusive clothing lines. She just wanted to find and buy stuffed animals Patty the Cow. Jess’s two sons with a collection of 461 Squishmallow stuffed animals. Photo: Jess Columbus. Finally, Jess was held in the arms of a soft pink and lavender cow, which she has been searching for for the past three years. Answering the question why she yearns for Patty the Cow so much, Jess said: “Because it’s cute. I like cows and pigs the most. ” After hundreds of moves to hunt from store to store, the 40-year-old woman bought or traded 461 Squishmallow stuffed animals. Each has its own name and the story attached to the inside of the mark. “Hobby exploded into something bigger than I imagined,” Jess admitted. The mother of two even built a group of more than 600 members living in the city of Pittsburgh (Pennsylvania) on a social network to exchange and find more missing items. Even with 461 Squishmallow at home, Jess still yearned for more stuffed animals called Simone the Shrimp. “I’m crazy looking at Walgreens right now,” she said. Many toy stores have a limit to one Squishmallow per customer. Photo: Haley Velasco / The Wall Street Journal. Endless passion Squishmallow is like the fancy toy kids collect for years. Many “hunters”, even though they are too young, say it is a process of finding and adding to the collection. “The Squishmallow collection reminded me a lot of Beanie Babies, Tamagotchis and Furbies’ hunts in the late 90s. Is there anything new in the store? ”Kayla Hill (31 years old), a user experience researcher in Auburn (Washington state), told Wall Street Journal. In addition to her main job, Kayla also helps run the official SquishmallowSquad group of 13,000 members of this stuffed animal maker. Sydni LaPlaga’s (23) Sydni LaPlaga’s hunt for Squishmallow took her from the Manahawkin neighborhood to the Seaside Coast in New Jersey. Here, the girl tried 75 animal grabs over many hours only to get 2 Squishmallow size 21 cm. “I love these hunts”, Kevin Jackson (23 years old), boyfriend of Sydni, shared. He also makes videos of Squishmallow hunts with his girlfriend. In the late 90s, the trend of collecting Beanie Babies teddy bear was popular in the country of flags. Photo: Getty Images. However, not all hunts are successful. During the holidays, Sarah Wicker (17 years old) often spends time searching for Carol the Christmas Tree stuffed animals around stores near her home in Urbandale (Iowa). After a few weeks with no results, she got discouraged and switched to buying online. From the city of Gilbert (Arizona), Sammy Kirchner (32 years old) and his best friend Nikki drove for more than 6 hours to “find” a stuffed animal named Tex the Taco in Anaheim (California). Even though the mission failed, they were happy to go on this amazing trip together. Sammy also shares this hobby with her husband Brett (31 years old) with two children, Lacey (10 years old) and Liam (7 years old). She said her family makes collecting stuffed animals a joint activity that the whole family can do together. At present, the family has amassed nearly 200 Squishmallow. “It’s like hunting for treasure,” Sammy said. Her whole family is still looking for Maggie the Stingray cotton collection despite hunting more than 30 different shops. Magic fever On TikTok, the hashtag #squishmallows has reached 1 billion views, while #squishmallowhunting is 231 million views. Sarah Wicker spends a lot of time and effort getting her Squishmallow stuffed animal from her crane engine. Photo: Sarah Wicker. In early April, Jazwares LLC’s Kellytoy, the maker of Squishmallows, said it had sold 82 million units since its introduction in 2017, in more than 1,000 different versions and sizes. . The price range for each stuffed animal is 2.99-59.99 USD. Some limited editions may be priced when resold on websites. The company also said that the number of orders for spring-summer 2021 tripled compared to the same period in 2020. For mother and daughter Diane Bowser (62) and Amanda Bowser (30), the owner of The Learning Express and The Teaching Room in Morristown (New Jersey), the Squishmallow stuffed toy brought the customer. come back here. Some of them are willing to drive for hours from New York or Pennsylvania to buy them. “Squishmallow has become a commodity we cannot keep in stock. Every time they were on the shelf, people immediately ran in to buy, ”Amanda said.

SpaceX denied claims that the Starlink and OneWeb satellites almost collided In a filing submitted to the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) after a meeting between representatives of SpaceX, OneWeb and FCC, SpaceX said that, in fact, the probability of a collision never exceeds the allowed threshold and the satellite will not be able to collide even if it is active. They have also corrected records regarding recent press releases regarding the physical coordination between SpaceX and OneWeb. Meeting between the parties took place the day after the flyer The Wall Street Journal published an article titled “Elon Musk’s satellite Internet project is too risky,” in which OneWeb made allegations that the Starlink satellites had approached other satellites alarmingly two. times in the past two years, including the last which took place on April 2, when a satellite Starlink Send a request to a OneWeb satellite to take collision avoidance measures. Sheet The Wall Street Journal quoted Chris McLaughlin, OneWeb’s director of legal and government relations, saying, “While working with OneWeb, SpaceX disabled the automated collision avoidance system supported by artificial intelligence (AI) to allow OneWeb to steer its satellite away from other satellites. It is unclear exactly why SpaceX disables the collision avoidance system when the Starlink satellite is within 57 meters from the opponent’s satellite. SpaceX has not yet commented on this issue. In a filing filed with the FCC on April 21, SpaceX said: “OneWeb recently made clear and inaccurate statements to the media about recent coordination. Specifically, Mr. McLaughlin of OneWeb told the newspaper Wall Street Journal that SpaceX has powered off the automatic satellite collision avoidance system. In reality, however, SpaceX and OneWeb have worked well together on a technical level. And OneWeb itself has asked SpaceX to temporarily turn off the AI ​​system to allow them to control the satellite as agreed by the parties. SpaceX’s automatic collision avoidance system has been and still works well at all times. According to SpaceX, OneWeb admitted wrongly and offered to withdraw its false statements during the meeting with SpaceX and FCC. SpaceX expressed its disappointment to the FCC that OneWeb officials chose to make public false information about the coordination’s plight. Successful coordination depends on trust and transparency among satellite operators. Also in the filing to the FCC, SpaceX confirmed that the possibility of collisions between satellites is very small. Other data also showed that “probability of collisions between satellites is below the permitted threshold and continues to decrease”. OneWeb launched satellite launch operations on April 3, and the satellites are eventually more than 1,000 meters apart. The probability of a collision happening is extremely small. Phan Van Hoa (According to Arstechnica)