Nieman Foundation at Harvard
ABOUT                    SUBSCRIBE
May 26, 2009, 3:34 p.m.


waterAccording to the Financial Times:

“When people really want or need something, they will pay for it, one way or another. If today’s publishers cannot convince their readers to do so, they will be overtaken by others that can.”

Setting aside the “should we or shouldn’t we?” questions biting at the ankles of Paid Content, let’s stipulate, for the moment, that eventually we’ll all pay in some way for news content. It’s a big assumption, currently untested in a major market. But making that assumption prompts what, I think, is a more interesting question:

Is news content gasoline, or is it bottled water?





Presumably, the same people buying water by the half-liter are spending the same disposable income on the latest digital Green Day single. Yet, almost universally, when asked, they say they won’t pay for digital news content at any price.

So what have Pepsi and Coke — both huge water-bottlers — figured out about selling packaged commodities that the collective minds of the newspaper industry have not? How do you sell something when so much of it is being given away for free?

POSTED     May 26, 2009, 3:34 p.m.
Show comments  
Show tags
I have come to bury Knewz, not to praise it