Membership · Publishing · 2026
An independent journal funded by readers instead of ads. The writing wasn't the hard part. Getting people to pay was, and then giving them a clean way to manage what they pay for.
Visit the live site the-lantern-ad1.pages.devThe Lantern runs essays, reporting, interviews, criticism, fiction, and a notebook. No ads and no trackers, because members cover the cost. Every site like this hits the same wall: people won't pay before they've read anything, but if it's all free they never pay at all.
Readers get three articles a month, then the paywall shows up. That's enough to get drawn in, not so much that joining feels pointless. Joining opens the full archive.
We spent the time on the unglamorous screens. You can move between monthly and annual, change tier, pause for a while, or cancel, and cancelling walks through the same retention steps a real subscription would. The billing is mocked for the demo, but these are the screens a paying member actually sees.
You land on a full newsroom that loads quickly, not a thin demo. The paywall asks instead of blocking. And nobody has to write in to change their plan.
The results
This project is an example project created to showcase our design and development capabilities.
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