http://www.techradar.com/news/internet/ ... ess-623527

Good luck with that you silly old git...

I do hope this isn't going to be the start of an industry wide adoption of this idea.
I know newspaper circulation and advertising revenues are hard-hit at the moment but I don't think charging for online stories is the way to go.
Newspapers probably want to claw back any revenue they can but doing this is only going to reduce the amount of traffic their websites get at the moment, in my opinion.

Mark

Quite simply I will read another newspaper online, I am not going to pay for the privilege of reading the Times online, especially when the site is riddled with adverts. I will read the Grauniad for as long as it remains free instead, and then the Telegraph etc etc.

As for Murdoch's statement:



What's The Sun's excuse then?

The whole thing with news is it's immediacy, otherwise nobody would give a crap - having to pull out your bank card and enter your details just to read something isn't gonna work, and that sh1t only needs to happen to an internet user once for them to take months coming back, if ever

And by the sounds of it, Murdoch's about to find out just how little stock his readers actually place in his papers' 'quality journalism'...

Please encourage him. Best news yet. Might at last rid ourselves of two of the worst papers in circulation.

Good news for their competitors as all the lost advertising revenue will be snapped up by them.

So please Murdoch, go ahead the sooner the better.

I thought The Sun was about the cheapest there was? I remember the adverts for "Your 10p Sun!"

Oh sure, the newspaper is. But if they need to start charging for access to the website for the Sun and the News of the Screws, presumably the money is going over to The Times to pay for the supposed 'quality journalism'?

To be honest even the "broadsheets" seem to be lacking in quality these days.

The thing is that he already charges for access to the Financial Times and the Wall Street Journal. You have free access to the headlines but any in-depth analysis you have to pay for. Now the FT / WSJ are almost trade papers and are required reading for a lot of their demographics where as the Times et al are not

There is also the fact that there are other similar publications that are free ( Sun – Sport or Times – Torygraph)so people will switch. There is also the BBC which will stay free

I think he will have difficulty but he owns a lot of the media so who knows

Just to clarify - Murdoch doesn't own the Financial Times.

This looks like the thin end of a wedge to me. Of course I'd be delighted if Murdoch were to try this & fail, but in reality he can cross-subsidise from his Chav-TV 'til the cows come home.

Ultimately I fear that for some good quality content (NOT Murdoch's!) we'll have to pay, or it will be lost.

The BBC news page is free, it may not be entirely balanced, but that is where the the thousands of independent sites comes in, offering a different views on the same news. I'd rather change sites than fill the pockets of another rich but sadly out-of-touch businessman.

As above.

I will give Murdoch credit though if he can find it within himself to utter 'All your news are belong to us!'

+1. One of the main reasons I go to the times website (apart from the fact that I used to read the Times newspaper) is for the reader's comments, as they give an indication (albeit skewed) of the public's view. Very helpful with medical stories. That, and Clarkson's columns.

I'll go elsewhere to.

Does anyone here actually check news sites on a daily basis, in the same way some people read the newspaper over breakfast?

I don't read any one particular news site. If I hear a story of interest, I use Google's news search and read what comes up. If the site asked me to login or pay, I would simply move to the next one. I have no reason to believe that the paid sites are less biased than the free ones. It's also interesting to compare American, British and other countries' coverage of world events. They often take a quite different perspective.

Presumably the BBC site will always available to me, since I pay the licence fee. If every news site charged, then I'd stick to the wireless. BBC Radio 4 FTW.