Brave does microtransactions by browsing. Before that, flattr basically did the same. There were apps that charged cents per article, or a few bucks for the entire paper. Subscriptions for multiple papers, to fix the “I’m not paying X for just one newspaper” problem, have also been introduced a few times. This stuff never caught on despite apps giving away discounts with that sweet VC money.
The problem isn’t technological. Most people just don’t want to pay. Some people missed all the different attempts at modernising news, but most people just seem to think paying a few euros per month is to much money for news.
Not all media should be government backed. Government backed news creates a huge conflict of interest.
There should be at least one source of government backed news to provide an alternative to sensationalist news, or course, but if everyone takes money from the government that the readership itself can’t provide, the risk or government interference is too high to trust the news.
My personal primary news source is completely government-funded, but it would be foolish to set up a system where every alternative has an incentive not to report on the government’s failings.
Brave does microtransactions by browsing. Before that, flattr basically did the same. There were apps that charged cents per article, or a few bucks for the entire paper. Subscriptions for multiple papers, to fix the “I’m not paying X for just one newspaper” problem, have also been introduced a few times. This stuff never caught on despite apps giving away discounts with that sweet VC money.
The problem isn’t technological. Most people just don’t want to pay. Some people missed all the different attempts at modernising news, but most people just seem to think paying a few euros per month is to much money for news.
None of that was backed by the government.
Not all media should be government backed. Government backed news creates a huge conflict of interest.
There should be at least one source of government backed news to provide an alternative to sensationalist news, or course, but if everyone takes money from the government that the readership itself can’t provide, the risk or government interference is too high to trust the news.
My personal primary news source is completely government-funded, but it would be foolish to set up a system where every alternative has an incentive not to report on the government’s failings.