Readers reluctant to pay for online news

Rupert Murdoch's aim to have readers pay for access to newspapers online has been called into question by a global survey that found readers are unlikely to pay for general news they can get elsewhere free.

Publishers wanting to charge for content on the internet should instead focus on niche markets, with readers of specialised sport and finance content seen as more willing to open their wallets, it said.

The PricewaterhouseCoopers survey on the outlook for newspapers in the digital age, Moving into multiple business models, found papers and online are likely to co-exist in the longer term. Yet despite the "huge potential" for online, print revenues would dominate "for some time".

Its release today comes after Mr Murdoch said last week that News Corp would start charging for some newspaper titles online over the next year.

Newspaper publishers are looking to online subscriptions and mobile content for new income streams as the global recession and a move of readers to the internet has dried up advertising revenues. PwC forecasts the global newspaper market will decline by 10.2 percent this year, followed by an average 2 percent annual contraction to 2013.

Readers interested in financial news and sport "expressed a relatively high willingness to pay for this content online", the study found. Finance readers were ready to pay up to 97 percent of the price of a general paper.

But overall, consumers were not prepared to pay as much for online content as for a traditional paper, and "would choose free content when the quality was comparable or sufficient for their purpose".

The survey, conducted in seven countries, was also at odds with some of the industry's hopes for new funding sources, seeing limited potential for electronic readers "due to unfamiliarity with this medium" and finding consumers were "currently unwilling to pay for online content on mobile devices".

However, the consultancy expected the consumer mindset would change in the next few years as people became more accustomed to spending money online.

PwC said Australian publishers were better off than their international peers, being in a less competitive market and having turned to inserted magazines, cross-advertising platforms and niche websites over recent years.

- © Fairfax NZ News