[akoboldfrying]

Not only news giants need revenue. Everyone producing news needs it, including any hoped-for smaller, more democratised new entrants to the industry.

Where will that revenue come from?

Should we expect high-quality journalism for free?

[contravariant]

Should people expect high quality journalism if revenue is based on the number of views?

Good journalism costs money, people should expect to pay.

Though I'd point out that publishing news is now cheaper than ever, and people were more than willing to pay for access before, so why shouldn't they be willing to pay less now?

Or perhaps more to the point, why are they _not_ willing to pay now? And is the reason something ad-based perhaps?

[akoboldfrying]

I interpreted your original post to mean that you found none of micropayments, ads or subscriptions to be acceptable. Now I have the impression that I misinterpreted you -- but I still can't tell what kind(s) of payment you would actually find acceptable.

What kind(s) of payment would you find acceptable?

[contravariant]

My preference would be free, single payment, subscription. Probably in that order.

I don't mind micropayments as a _method_ to achieve any of those, but I don't like them as a replacement for ads. And I don't accept the premise that ads should be replaced with something similar.

[akoboldfrying]

Thanks. By "single payment", do you mean one payment for lifetime access? I'm aware of a personal cloud storage provider that offers this, but I don't think it could work for news.