Friday, March 30, 200l

There is still infinitely more free content available on the Internet than pay-for-view or subscription sales, but more and more sites are actively soliciting funds from readers, according to Wired News.

The reasons for what is being called a "free-to-fee" trend are simple enough: Web site owners need the revenue and more and more people are willing to pay. There's also a "gotcha" factor at work here, as many Web surfers have gotten used to reading this or that site and now will have to pay or change their habits. According to writer Aparna Kumar, "Major League Baseball said it was going to start charging people $9.95 to listen to audio broadcasts of its baseball games on the Web."

Many sites like Salon.com are trying a subscription model for enhanced or ad-free content, although some analysts think this approach will fail since readers can always find related or similar content available for free. As the author notes, however: "The thing is, every site seems to think its content is unique and worth paying for." Salon chief Michael O'Donnell thinks that people are willing to pay for a particular "point of view," which should be encouraging to many writers and content producers if in fact this proves to be the case.

Finally, thanks to the services of companies like Amazon.com and PayPal, many Web sites are now able to solicit donations in lieu of actually charging for access or subscriptions. The success of this tactic would seem to depend on popularity or goodwill, but the "click to support so-and-so" buttons are popping up everywhere.