Last Thursday, the New York Times released a bleak report that indicated weak revenues throughout the first quarter of 2013. But bleaker still is the dismal reporting from the paywall: this quarter saw the weakest growth from its digital subscriber base, raising just 5.6% to 676,000 total users.

The new subscriber base for the Times has slowed considerably year-over-year, but this is the first time that growth dipped under 10%.

This graph, developed by Quartz, shows the progression from the last year:

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Did you know that April is National Poetry Month? The New York Times sure does, and the venerable publication is making the most of it with their newest blog, Times Haiku. The blog itself is actually a bot, combing through all of the Times‘s articles from the day and putting them together in neat little haiku packages — naturally displaying in the standard five-seven-five syllable set the poem requires.

“We started with a basic rhyming lexicon, but over time we’ve added syllable counts for words like “Rihanna” or “terroir” to keep pace with the broad vocabulary of The Times,” writes Senior Software Architect and Times hacker Jacob Harris.

Scrolling through the blog, which is powered by Tumblr, one can easily snicker at the randomness of it all — evoking the odd pleasure of other bots like the popular @horse_ebooks, which combs through free ebooks online and takes out snippets of the words. But Harris, who actually reverse-engineered @horse_ebooks to understand the nature of bots, has a little bit more sophistication up his sleeve in the form of careful curation by the Times‘ own journalists, who comb through the bot’s results to find the most interesting poems. Read more

This morning, The New York Times announced a radical redesign of its website — a slimmed-down and minimalistic experience that evokes the Times stunning and oft-replicated digital experience “Snow Fall.” The design marries a lot of what users have raved about the Times‘ iPad experience, while also offering “premium” space for ads.

“As we continue to develop our rich content offerings across video, slideshows, data visualization and interactive graphics, these adjustments to NYTimes.com provide the structure our newsroom needs to deliver a best-in-class digital news report,” says excutive Jill Abramson in the company’s blog.

As the Times continues to aggressively keep up with the evolution of digital design, there’s plenty of takeaways to apply to any website. Keep in mind these three tips, and you can ensure your website is ahead of the curve.

1. Web Design Is Constantly Evolving

The Times has certainly come a long way from the design it had ten years ago, but there’s no denying that it’s missing the edge of some modern publications, such as the responsive design of Mashable or the new Kinja layout of Gawker publications Deadspin and Jalopnik. In order to keep up with the times, the Times has to adapt.

Here are just a few features the Times is including in its beta design: Read more

On the surface, it’s been a huge year for Youtube and its string of premium content providers. The website is becoming bigger, and has recently acquired startup Epoxy to help developers and distributors get their work on the site faster and more frequently. In addition to the rise in Youtube developers like Maker Studios  and Machinima, new premium channels are popping up left and right — fashion and lifestyle network StyleHaul netted $4.4. million in Series A funding this February, and Demand Media’s newcomer Tastemade plans to do the same for food.

But news companies aren’t clamoring to take part in Youtube. In fact, the video company endured a messy breakup last month with Reuters and Wall Street Journal, pulling millions of dollars in funding and laying off more than a dozen contractors in the process. To put it simply: premium Youtube ventures and news do not mix. Read more

Yesterday, the New York Times and Starbucks announced a partnership that would grant 15 free articles to digital users on the Starbucks Wi-Fi. This isn’t the first time the companies have forged a media partnership — Starbucks outlets across the country have carried a newsstand of the paper, and this loophole maneuver might draw more readers to the coffee shop (and pick up a digital subscription over time).

But is it just another paywall, buried in our real world instead of on our computers?

The Times has already clarified that the system will not allow readers to choose their articles at whim — rather, there will be an available landing page that features a mix of articles from various Times sections as well as breaking news and most-emailed and a rotating “special” section that rotates daily. All of these articles can be accessed daily, through the Starbucks Digital Network or SDN, a fancy way of referring to every store’s free Wi-Fi offerings. Read more