A free online Wall Street Journal? Murdoch likes the idea

That didn't take long. Having splashed out $5.6 billion to buy The Wall Street Journal last month, Rupert Murdoch is already talking about making the online version of the newspaper free of charge. According to Reuters, Mr Murdoch views a free online Wall Street Journal as potentially more lucrative than its current subscription model. Mr Murdoch rejects the view that ditching the $99-per-year subscription in favour of a fully ad-supported site would harm the most successful online publishing business model in existence.

The switch to freely available online content would help boost readership and revenue globally, Mr Murdoch told attendees of a Goldman Sachs media conference in New York yesterday. "Will you lose $50 million to $100 million in revenue? I don't think so," Mr Murdoch said, according to Reuters. "If the site is good, you'll get much more."

While he still hasn't made a final decision on the matter, it's becoming abundantly clear that paying for news is a model that is nearing obsolescence. And, it's a move I predicted here even before Mr Murdoch clinched the deal. The New York Times beat Mr Murdoch to the punch earlier this week, scrapping, as suspected, the subscription-based TimesSelect service. The Financial Times too seems to be fazing out its paid-for offerings, with more and more breaking news available free of charge.

The move is not without risk. Relying solely on online advertising could backfire if the market were to suddenly implode, or, more likely, Google swallowed up all the ads. But for now, the aim of online publishing is to attract the world's largest audience, and steadily increase your ad rates. That may be the only way to keep Google at bay.