There’s been a lot of talk recently about newspapers charging for online content. Famously, Rupert Murdoch of the News Corporation said that the newspapers under his command – which include the Times and the Sun in the UK – would move to pay-per-view formats. More recently, Johnston Press in the UK has begun charging readers to read their articles online.

Johnston Press is one of the largest newspaper firms in the UK, and publishes a wealth of local newspapers. Taking part in its pilot scheme are the Worksop Guardian, the Ripley & Heanor News, the Northumberland Gazette and the Whitby Gazette, and – in Scotland – the Carrick Gazette and the Southern Report. The Scotsman – another Johnston Press title – already has a pay-per-view model in place.

News… at a cost

It costs £5 for a three-month online subscription to these papers, and readers must be registered to the site. But is this a good idea? Will readers really want to pay money to read their news online?

The move isn’t without precedent. The Wall Street Journal (another News Corporation publication) has charged for an annual online subscription since 1996. The model can work, and newspapers do undoubtedly need to find a new source of income as ad revenues continue to drop.

I have to be honest, I’m going to go with ‘no: this is not a good idea’. There was a tremendous online backlash when Rupert Murdoch made his announcement, and he’s dealing with some of the biggest, most well-known newspapers in the world. Chances are that, if and when he finally does make the move to pay-per-view (possibly in Spring), he won’t be short of subscribers… but the Whitby Gazette? I imagine that anyone interested enough to even know of its existence will either dig out a physical copy or go elsewhere for their news. The internet is a big place, full of free news and information.

Why this won’t work

For the model to work, every single reputable news outlet would have to simultaneously swap to the pay-per-view model. All of them. Because if they don’t, all of the readers will just shift to the free ones. We know about the Times and the Sun and the Wall Street, and the Financial Times is also now looking at pay-per-view… but what about the Guardian and the Daily Mail? These are huge online brands already, with substantial, well-developed websites that have alternative sources of income.

And what about the BBC website, already the prime source of news of many British websurfers? The BBC isn’t actually allowed to charge for their online content – they’re having trouble even putting their iPlayer up onto a paid gaming service.

What about the countless blogs and forums and online-only news outlets that already have business models based around an audience that doesn’t have to pay to read their content?

The problem is that many of the traditional media outlets are refusing to change their business models, and refusing to look at the internet with a fresh, critical eye. Rupert Murdoch was recently pulled up by Huffington Post founder Arianna Huffington, who accused him of having “a fundamental lack of understanding of the web and how it works“. Unfortunately, it looks like a number of our favourite morning reads are going to turn effectively invisible until they figure out that, if nothing else, information is cheap online.

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UPDATE: Google is offering a compromise to the newspaper publishing world that seeks to retain newspaper paywalls without inconveniencing online readers. Andrew Nusca at ZDNet has written an excellent article on the subject.