End of free news?

[Mulder]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8186701.stm

I predict very few people will pay for online news! The end of free news? I don't think so.

[Trinoc]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8186701.stm

I predict very few people will pay for online news! The end of free news? I don't think so.

What sort of idiot would choose to get the news from Murdoch outlets anyway, even if free?

[chaggle]

What sort of idiot would choose to get the news from Murdoch outlets anyway, even if free?

A ME sort of idiot thanks Trinoc!! The Times is my paper of choice (when I can be bothered to get one now which isn't often).

He believes that a micro-charging structure, where readers pay just 5p or 10p to access an article, might work. "This is less than the price of an SMS [text message]," he argued.

That actually seems quite a lot to me. How much is a quality newspaper? Less than a pound I expect. I would expect to get as good or better value on-line.

[Croydon Bob]

A ME sort of idiot thanks Trinoc!! The Times is my paper of choice (when I can be bothered to get one now which isn't often).

I've read The Times and The Sun recently and I really can't see much difference now. The Sun has a few more colour pictures, the Times has a bit more badly written text. All the old broadsheets have dumbed down but The Times seems to have fallen down. I can't imagine why you would still read The Times even if you used to do so.

That actually seems quite a lot to me. How much is a quality newspaper? Less than a pound I expect. I would expect to get as good or better value on-line.

Yup. 1p an article would seem more realistic. Consider that in London we get two free newspapers every day, I get two free local papers every week, there's several free weekly papers and magazines handed out at stations, The Star has been 20p an issue for some weeks now. Then there's all the other national papers that are still going to have free news on the interweb, as is the BBC that has far more comprehensive coverage than the Murdoch Empire anyway (but less tits). Why would anyone pay 5p an article?

[Question Authority]

Not surprised in the least to hear this and I've kinda been waiting for this trend to start. I don't know about print in the UK, but it's suffering terribly in the US, with many papers closing their doors because of lack of subscriptions. I subscribe to the Los Angeles Times for a 4-day delivery (Thu thru Sun) and have heard a few times about the possibility they may end up closing their doors. (We lost our alternative paper about 20-25 years ago, which limited us to a single viewpoint (locally, I mean), and that's bad enough without losing all print)

I for one would never pay for content on the Internet, but since I'm usually in the minority (lol), I imagine that enough people will. Although I'm reminded of satellite radio which - last I heard - wasn't really doing all that well. I guess not as many people as they thought would be willing to pay for radio content if they can get it for free with a few commercial breaks (is why we have pre-sets, so we can easily find one that isn't airing ads, lol).

Initially, this movement may be slow to grow, but I think eventually we'll see most "reputable" (theoretically, lol) news sources become pay-per-view.

[Mulder]

The idea of free content grew with the internet. If people can get something free, they just go and look elsewhere. There's always someone doing it free.

The real problem here is the effect of the decline of print on journalism. We certainly wouldn't want to be left in the situation where only governments supplied news (paid out of taxes), in tandem with a lot of know-nothing bloggers.

I don't know what the solution to this problem is but paid internet news content isn't going to take off.

[Balloonbasket]

Maybe we could just keep the news a secret, and not tell anybody, either in print or online. No news is good news, wink.

[Question Authority]

The real problem here is the effect of the decline of print on journalism. We certainly wouldn't want to be left in the situation where only governments supplied news (paid out of taxes), in tandem with a lot of know-nothing bloggers.

Yep. And I'm afraid there has already been some effect, although this is one of those chicken-or-egg situations. Credibility within print journalism had already been on the decline by the time blogging became a word. And certainly people's naive ability to believe anything they read (based upon prior comfort zones with journalism that are deeply embedded in our psyches) contributes to that problem.

And to build upon that, the possibility that a reported "truth" could be conceived of as "dissention" by any sitting government, a form of dissent that is "not allowed", is greater than I think many people realize.

[polomint38]

Consider that in London we get two free newspapers every day

In the Morning

Metro (greater London) Tube and Train station
City AM (In the City area) Distributed by People at street level

In the Evening 4pm+

TheLondonPaper (Distributed by vendors(?) and at train stations)
London Lite (Sister paper to Metro) (distributed by vendors(?) at street level and at train stations)

Bob, that is 4 papers a statistical error of 100%

[Mulder]

And none of them worth cutting down trees for ...

[polomint38]

and none of them worth cutting down trees for ...

[Croydon Bob]

In the Morning

Metro (greater London) Tube and Train station
City AM (In the City area) Distributed by People at street level

In the Evening 4pm+

TheLondonPaper (Distributed by vendors(?) and at train stations)
London Lite (Sister paper to Metro) (distributed by vendors(?) at street level and at train stations)

Bob, that is 4 papers a statistical error of 100%

Well, if we're going to nitpick about tiny little 100% errors then I'll have you know that I've never been given or seen a copy of City AM as I work in the City of Westminster not the City of London, and thelondonpaper isn't a paper it is a comic with fewer and less challenging articles than The Dandy.

[polomint38]

Well, if we're going to nitpick about tiny little 100% errors then I'll have you know that I've never been given or seen a copy of City AM as I work in the City of Westminster not the City of London, and thelondonpaper isn't a paper it is a comic with fewer and less challenging articles than The Dandy.

Or indeed any other quality Comics like the Beano, Whizzer & Chips. etc...

[Croydon Bob]

Or indeed any other quality Comics like the Beano, Whizzer & Chips. etc...

I don't want you to feel old or anything but W&C was cancelled in 1990. That's nearly 20 years ago. But as it was an IPC/Fleetway comic it was better than the Dandy or Beano published by DC Thompson the grumpy old Scotsman.

[Trinoc]

And none of them worth cutting down trees for ...

If they stopped printing free London papers it would put most of the tube train litter collectors out of work (and probably the overland train and bus ones as well).