According to a recent study, we’re not overly impressed with Rupert Murdoch’s plans to charge for use of his on line news websites. Of 2,000 folks asked if they would ever pay for on the internet news, 9 out of ten stated ‘No!’. Does that imply that Murdoch’s choice to charge customers to access his news sites is foolish?

I would not pay for news, either, unless…

If I were asked ‘would you ever pay for on the internet news?’, I would probably say ‘no’, also. Soon after all, in an age when we can ordinarily read about important events on Twitter just before any of the news channels report them, why would we ever want pay for access to their content?

On the other hand, I would, and frequently do, spend for top quality and ‘luxury’ news. I would never ever spend a penny for one particular of the shrinking quantity of no cost newspapers handed out on my way to work in a morning, but I would pay for a Sunday broadsheet with all its extras and trimmings (even though the probabilities of me really reading more than a couple of pages are really modest).

I have also been known to sign up to a paid members’ area on the website of a specific football team (which shall remain nameless) to achieve access to added content not out there on the primary web page: video interviews and press conferences, highlights of reserve and youth group matches, reside radio commentary on match days.

Would I spend to study The Sun online? No. There are commonly only about 2 paragraphs in each and every image-dominated short article anyway. It only charges a couple of pennies to acquire the real point so there wouldn’t be significantly worth in utilizing its website. The Times? Perhaps, but only if all other high-quality news outlets starting charging, otherwise I’d just go for the totally free one particular.

Utilizing a Credit Card for a 20p Report?

I am not positive how significantly Mr Murdoch wants to charge his customers to read an write-up, but I’m guessing there is going to be some sort of account that wants setting up. I absolutely couldn’t be bothered to get my wallet out each time I wanted to study something and I would be very hesitant to commit to subscribing.

On the other hand, if they had a comparable technique to iTunes, whereby you just enter your password to acquire access to a paid article and your card is billed accordingly, that could make a bit more sense. But, if I had to do that for every single big news provider, it would grow to be really tiresome.

Eventually, they could be shooting themselves in the foot to some extent. If the internet site makes it harder and less handy for me to study an write-up, I’ll possibly go elsewhere. I would assume that I would usually be able to read the news for free on the BBC’s site, which would not be excellent news for the advertising income of the Murdoch on the internet empire.

Copycats

Assuming that I essentially wanted to study an write-up on a paid web site so badly that I handed over my credit card details to them, what would stop me ‘reporting’ on what the short article mentioned on my freely accessible blog? I would consider it would be quite tough for a newspaper group to prevent thousands of bloggers disseminating the details freely to their customers who would acquire lots of site visitors in the course of action.

Recipe for Results?

The success or failure of paid news is in the process used to charge and engage with users, assuming that the customers worth the content material very enough to deem it worth paying for. yoursite.com is absolutely nevertheless out on the complete notion and the chances are that numerous will attempt and fail just before a profitable method is developed. Until then, we’ll have to wait and see.