News Sites to Charge for Content

Most new sites do not currently charge for content, but that could all change within a year. During a speech in London, Financial Times Editor Lionel Barber said he could, "confidently predict that within the next 12 months, almost all news organizations will be charging for content."

This prediction comes after Rupert Murdoch of News Corporation made a statement in May in which he said his newspaper websites, such as The New York Times, would likely begin charging for content within a year. Incidentally, the New York Times recently let it slip that it was considering a $5 dollars per month subscription fee.

Barber said the payment models were not yet determined but did mention that charging article-by-article was an option along with charging weekly or monthly subscription fees.

It's no secret that the newspaper industry has been struggling and has even been labeled as dead. Newspaper sales have declined vigorously upon the rise of the Internet. The industry has even gone so far as to blame Google for their woes claiming the engine steals their content.

But will charging for content save the newspapers? What would this mean for news aggregators and more importantly, what does this mean for bloggers? And on the flip side, will charging for content further doom the newspapers?

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