The end of the road for paid content?

Bad news for struggling newspapers: nine out of ten UK consumers would never pay for online news, reports Press Gazette.

They highlight a survey of more than 2,000 consumers by Lightspeed Research which asked what content users wouldn’t be prepared to pay for online.

It found that 91 per cent of respondents would never pay for news online and 90 per cent would be unwilling to pay for news analysis.

This follows a Harris Interactive poll, commissioned last month by Paid Content, which found that just five per cent of readers were willing to pay for online news.

The survey, says the article, is yet further evidence against publishers, like Rupert Murdoch, who intend to start charging for access to their websites.

But, reports Press Gazette, News Corp claims to have conducted its own audience research in Australia, the UK and US, which gives it confidence that people will happily pay for news content across a range of digital devices.

Surprisingly, the Lightspeed survey found that it is the older age group that seems the most unwilling to pay for news content.

Of those aged 16 to 24, 86 per cent would never pay for news online, while in the 45 to 54 age sectors, 96 per cent said they would not pay, according to MediaWeek.