By: Jesse Oxfeld The New York Post began requiring registration to access its Web site Tuesday morning, causing server overloads, frustration for its online readers, and some mockery from its bitter crosstown rival, the Daily News.
Not only were users surprised Tuesday to find the Post site requiring a login and password, they also found that its overwhelmed systems couldn't process the rush of registrations and, when a user could successfully register, frequently couldn't successfully serve the article page being sought.
"The New York Post went eyeball to eyeball with an angry public last week," wrote Lloyd Grove, the News' star gossip columnist, in Thursday's paper. "Late yesterday, the Post blinked."
By Wednesday afternoon, the Post had removed password requirements from at least some of its content.
But a Post spokeswoman says plans to require registration are still on track.
"We anticipated this week's issues as much as possible," she told E&P on behalf of the paper. "We have 2.8 million unique users and some 90 million page views a month, many of whom tried to register on that first day. Despite initial glitches, which we addressed and resolved with additional resources, the registration process continues, as do our users' visits to the Web site.
"The numbers to date speak for themselves," she continued. "On the first day of registration, we expected page views to significantly as users adjusted to the new procedure. But instead we averaged 2,905,200 page views [this week], a mere 2,500 off the previous week."
The spokeswoman said no other Post officials would be available for comment.
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