Pay to Play 3.0: Same Old Tune?

摘要

I am now living through the third wave of arguments for fee-rnI based digital content models in the decade and a half I have covered the internet publishing world. The inevitable response to the dual forces of recessionary ad decline and the more tectonic and irreversible shift to digital has been: "Make 'em pay." Almost everyone on the consumer side of the fence is talking about "hybrid" models and "pay areas." It is hard to listen to such a conversation without someone dropping "the iTunes precedent" as an argument that both micropayment mechanisms and consumer attitudes have turned the corner on this issue. People are ready to underwrite the costly content industry. They see the ugly alternative (bad or shallow content), and they are more willing to put a cash value on digital media now.