[roc]

There's certainly a one-time cost in gathering and validating facts (though I'd be surprised if much time at all was spent validating these days). But as facts can't be protected as intellectual property, they will inevitably be repeated, bringing the ultimate cost to consumers down to the cost of distribution. Which, today, is pretty close to $0.

Also, increasingly, facts are self-reported by the audience. Who needs an international bureau when they can simply search for native sources? (e.g. Where does the average reader get their facts regarding the Iranian protests?) Events involving widespread infrastructure failure (Haiti) are an exception.

... You want a citation for it being easier to moderate paying subscribers vs anonymous posts?

[robg]

The Iranian protests are a good example where we don't know the impact without some context. They appear powerful and yet it could just be a vocal (and tech savvy) minority.

Where do people pay to comment and get preferential placement?

[roc]

The Iranian protests also draw into sharp relief the assumption of quality on the part of information gathering by 'real' news sources.

How long was it until American news even acknowledged the protests existed? And how much are they truly vetting their facts, when they run transparent propaganda (government dismissal of the actions of a 'few hundred' when nearly a dozen independent sources contributed pictures of at least tens of thousands) and trivially photoshop 'counter-demonstrations'?

Citizen-journalism has its flaws, but it's very similar to the case of Wikipedia (for lack of a more succinct explanation): Any one person could easily post lies, but lies tend to get exposed and corrected. And in the aggregate, it's more accurate than any individual 'expert' or 'authoritative' source.

Fark is the stand-by example of preferential comment treatment. TotalFark subscribers are kicking in $5/mo for early access to a veritable cess pit of dupes and spam, in exchange for getting first crack at discussion and token member features.

I also have personal experience with several small discussion boards that went for-pay specifically to squash spam and cover the moderator costs of abusive behavior.

It's pretty easy to see where making people give you $5 before they can post shifts the economics of spamming, flaming, harassing, etc.