In an effort to raise profits online, many newspapers have turned to paywalls of varying degrees of flexibility and restriction. Almost two years after they first implemented it, The Boston Globe‘s paywall has already become even stricter, with the paper quietly changing their policy in December last year. The Globe will now let readers share only two accessible links a month on social media.

Dan Kennedy on Nieman Journalism Lab writes that,

“The restrictions were brought home to me recently when I learned that the paper had started limiting social media sharing to only two free links a month — a serious limit on someone like me, who regularly shares links on my blog, on Facebook and on Twitter. As a subscriber, I can share as many links as I like, of course. But non-subscribers can only click on two before getting a message that they cannot pass go.”

According to Globe spokesperson, Ellen Clegg, the move is part of their continued experimentation, “to find the right balance between the free-sharing culture of the Internet and paid access to premium Globe content.”

Although the need to innovate and try new parameters is clear, these kinds of restrictions will surely hurt the Globe‘s discoverability for reader. These are readers and possible subscribers lost, who would have been brought to the content when their friends shared it on Twitter and Facebook.