and they didn't sell out
maybe the NYT has seprate rules for the gators
I have a theory on this. No proof, just a theory. I don't think TS is making the ton of money from the pay site like everybody thinks. They had about 30,000 members signed up on the free site on that last day. Most of them never posted, but many of them visited the site to read it. And who knows how many people came by to read but never signed up. Combine the insane amount of traffic they had along with the fact that they had ads plastered in every single corner of the page, and I will bet they probably made as much money on the free site as they do on the subscription site. I don't know which site makes more, but the point here is that they also made lots of money on the free version. They may have ads on the pay site, I don't know. I have never been there. But I can guarantee you that the traffic is a drop in the bucket compared to the free site, so if they do have ads they aren't making any where near as much money on them. I would be very surprised if the much smaller ad revenue combined with the subscription fees is enough to equal the ad revenue they received on the pay site. I really don't think the primary motivation here was the money.
So, if it wasn't the money, then what was it? I think a big factor was all of the trouble makers they had to deal with constantly. Random guys showing up and posting porn for example. Constant flame wars. Soft porn for avatars. TideSports was owned by the Tuscaloosa News, which is of course is a business. And the Tuscaloosa News is owned by the New York Times. As a business, they probably did not like the "image" that was being portrayed in "their" forum. It wasn't professional and just didn't look good at all.
Now private sites like shaggy bevo, tiger droppings, or Woolly Al, they don't care about protecting their business interests. The site isn't attached to a business. They are going for no censorship and freedom of expression, not for publicity and traffic for their business.
So my theory is that they put up the pay wall out of frustration to drive away the trouble makers once and for all. Nobody is going to pay many, then go in there to cause trouble and get banned.
I don't follow the gatorsports forum, so I have no idea what it is like. But TS was horrible the last couple of years from a business image standpoint. My guess is that gatorsports probably has some trouble makers from time to time, but not as bad as TS there at the end. If it ever gets that bad look for them to switch over to a pay site as well.
It probably wasn't the only factor, but I would just about guarantee you it was a contributing factor. And I would be very surprised if they make a lot more many than the free site did back when it was rocking, if not less.