The Wall Street Journal Online: One-Year Online Subscription

The interactive Journal delivers stock quotes on demand, continually updated news, a customized news- and portfolio-tracking service, access to extensive archives, and "briefing books" for 22,000 companies and more than 7,000 U.S. mutual funds.

Readers who are familiar with the print edition will not be surprised by the interactive Journal's personality: it looks a lot like the paper version, and it's just as staid as its paper counterpart. Navigation is intuitive and ease of use is... easy.

Unlike the print journal, this version follows you to work and around the world. All you need is your password and laptop to carry this invaluable business partner to any meeting, anywhere. --Stefanie Durbin

So, what's so good about this website? If you read the The Wall Street Journal regularly, you will have access to information that the general public only hears about several days later through standard media outlets. I found this to be the case time and time again. I would read some random article on Monday, and the following Thursday or Friday the local or national news would be featuring a "late breaking" story that was almost word-for-word what I had read about in the journal earlier! The website, while not perfect, allows you to search for specific articles, research various companies, and retrieve stock quotes. Yes, almost all of these features are available for free on other sites, but you get it all here in one place. The editorial section, while usually conservative, is well written and often has guest authors who are very "deep" in their particular subject area.

In some ways I miss the paper edition. You can take it with you, read it on the bus, sit outside and read it, etc. However, the benefits of the online edition more than make up for these deficiencies. I recommend this publication in the online format. For me, it has been money well spent.


Powerful Business Tool   March 19, 2003
Patrick S. Pope (Chicago, IL)
24 out of 26 found this review helpful

As a WSJ journal addict who is traveling a great deal, I found it better to eliminate my paper subscription and go electronic. At first, I had both the print and online versions, but I found the paper version wasteful as it still contains stock quotes and large print ads on stock offerings.

While I have no way of knowing if other reviewers have a different online WSJ with pop-up advertisements, which I doubt, there are none on mine. In fact, the online WSJ is vastly more streamlined than Forbes, Fortune, CNN, etc. The clutter-free layout allows for easy navigation.

The content of the WSJ is unparalleled. What makes the online version so powerful for business research, lead generation and job hunting is the search capability. My major complaint is that free search only goes back for thirty days. For those who want to pay [$] per article, you can use the advanced search page and access Factiva/Dow Jones, which covers hundreds of publication both large and small. Dow Jones argues that they have to compensate the content owners. Yet, they don't even offer WSJ articles that are already owned.

If you are looking for business ideas or contacts, the WSJ is an excellent publication. The online WSJ makes gathering this information less consuming than the print version.


Watch Out - Automatic Renewals and No Refunds   October 28, 2005
News Reader (New Jersey)
22 out of 22 found this review helpful

This is not a complaint about Amazon, just the Wall Street Journal On-Line. I subscribed to WSJ Online and used a credit card to pay. As my subscription was ending, I started receiving e-mails saying that my credit card had expired and the subscription would not renew. That was fine with me because I hardly ever used it. Despite those messages, the subscription did renew and I received a much higher charge on my credit card than I had paid in the previous year. When I tried to cancel my unwanted subscription I was told that WSJ Online would not give any refunds and that I was stuck with the one year subscription.


top notch news and easy access!   December 6, 2001
20 out of 23 found this review helpful

I subscribed to the print edition 3 years ago, since then
had had no time to read the paper daily and saw the paper
piling up and go to waste. I regretted my subscription because
of this.

But, the WSJ is just essential reading for me, so for the
past year I would drop by the library on the weekends and
peruse the sections that I wanted to, and save the wastage
of paper and money. Getting to the library though, was a bit
dodgy due to my schedule,their hours of operation etc.

Now, that the WSJ is available online I rely on this edition,
not only for WSJ, but The Economist, Scientific American, National Geographic etc.

I highly recommend the WSJ online subscription.
I find I do not need to spend my time at the library on
this reading but other browsing, and I can read this from
a computer anywhere. The site/publication is not graphics
heavy and remains as always an extremely well written, well thought out newspaper edition.

All the benefits of the newspaper without the paper. :)

If you have the ability to afford slightly less than a
dollar a week on an electronic subscription I recommend
you give this a try, [ they have an online trial subscription] and then sign up for the year's subscription...

Enjoy!

cheers,
Mary


Don't use your credit card; order this subscription pack   September 6, 2002
Kevin (Hong Kong)
19 out of 30 found this review helpful

Don't use your credit card to subsript to the online WSJ, or your credit card info will be kept on their web site(even after the transcation) and you will be bound by the contract for renewal. To get off the contract, you have to make a personal call to the customer service. It is a shame for such a prestigious business journal to take this porn site approach.

I have been reading the WSJ for more than 10 yrs, and I notice a recent drop of quality in its articles. (research/foreign staff cut?)

Because of that, I no longer read the WSJ daily. I turn to the Business Week for weekly summary, and the McKinesy Quarterly Review and the Harvard Business Review for more business reading.

The online WSJ used to be a nice companion to the printed version while I was on the road. But the new design of the online WSJ web site is so difficult to use and confusing that now I'll just watch CNBC/CNN fn in the hotel room instead.