In order to give all of our listeners perpetual access to items they purchased in our old system, we had to create a class of “membership” called Legacy Memberships. There is a Legacy Membership associated with every back issue of the Journal and with each other item we sold or gave away as premiums to people who renewed their subscriptions.

Any Legacy memberships that might be displayed on your Account page will be tied to particular products. (We’re in the process of preparing about 430,000 records for importing into this system before our new app is ready.)

The system we’re using isn’t configured to sell individual products, so the workaround was to label a previously purchased product as a “membership.” And the “Lifetime” designation indicates perpetual access — no expiration date — whether or not you sign up as a member.

Several people suggested that we tell listeners that they can download from our current site all of the content they previously ordered by such-and-such a date, and then we wouldn’t have to worry about providing “lifetime” access. But many people may not know how to get a collection of downloaded mp3 files onto their phones, so that they can listen while traveling. We decided to embrace an initially confusing system in the interest of greater generosity.

Please contact us if you have any questions related to your account.