Is Pay For Content the Answer For Newspapers?

Remember just a couple years ago when you had to pay to access much of the New York Times' Web site? No Maureen Dowd, Frank Rich or other columnists were available for free. Many of the main news articles were free, but when you clicked on something with the "Time Select" logo, you were denied access. Then, in 2007, the NYT opened their site to everyone. The rationale at the time was to increase advertising revenue and search engine optimization/continuity (if you found an article that went back any length of time, it was in the Times Select category).

Now, the industry in even more serious decline, Rupert Murdoch is going to a pay for content model. The Detroit Newspapers have also gone this route - even limiting the number of days their printed product is home-delivered. The Financial Times has been a paid site for years - here's the article about it in today's NYT.

I've always been a newspaper fan - I read the Detroit News every day from 7th grade (even through college) until I moved to Milwaukee in my late 20's. My daily media "diet" includes several papers. I was ready to pay for "Times Select" when they changed the model. Yes, I'm willing to pay for content - the right content, of course. But I would prefer a "network" of sites to have access to. To just pay for one seems like a luxury.

Am I, however, the norm? I doubt it.