An alternative to micropayment: a monthly voluntary payment for online news?

Posted by Emma Heald on February 18, 2009 at 4:24 PM

In response to industry discussion about the possibility of a micropayment system, Steve Outing has proposed a different idea to bring in revenue for newspapers: voluntary monthly payments. "The user must be given the option of whether to pay for a Web site's content (by financially supporting the site) or read it for free," Outing asserted, and explained that he believes newspapers will not be able to charge individually, rather readers would pay (if they chose) a monthly fee for all the news and blog content on the Web. They could then choose to direct part of their fee towards supporting individual publications. Outing explained the concept in great detail in an Editor & Publisher article on February 10, and pointed out a Californian start-up venture called Kachingle which is proposing to operate such a system.

His proposal has received a combination of praise and criticism, he wrote in his blog, where he decided to respond to some of the criticism. He insists that he was suggesting this contribution model as just one revenue source among others that newspapers could use, and that he believes that "the main way that most news websites will earn enough money to survive will continue to be advertising," so they should reinvent their ad models. To claims that what he is advocating is some kind of 'tip-jar' which people just won't pay for, he responds that this is different, as it will not be as if individual publications are begging, and he suggests using "persuasive technology" to encourage people to sign up.

Outing believes that micropayments are "SUCH a bad idea," because paid content has already been tried and has failed, and it is "completely counter to the nature of the Internet." And he has a good point, but it is necessary to remember that a micropayment system has not actually been tried, newspapers only experimented with subscription-based payment. The idea may well be not consistent with principles of the Internet, but as long as any paid content system was industry-wide and very affordable, it would allow users to surf the news in much the same way as they do now. The one flaw that stands out in Outing's voluntary system is that it just would not make enough money: pointing out that it should be just one revenue stream for newspapers is all very well, but is continuing to rely on advertising for the majority of their income the best way forward for newspapers?

Source: Editor & Publisher, SteveOuting.com