[trinket]

This is interesting - LWN has tried to support itself on a subscription model (subscribers get access to articles 1 week early), but apparently revenue isn't high enough: http://lwn.net/Articles/350385/

Many commenters have pointed out that Ars Technica manages to have in-depth technical articles supported by only ads and asked why LWN can't do that same. Honestly, I'm not convinced the Ars Technica proposition is enough to make me sign up - but I'm a poor student and so very little really would unless I viewed it as essential to my studies.