Free Subscriptions! Good or Bad?

Rupert Murdoch says he plans to abolish subscription fees at The Wall Street Journal’s Web site, according to news accounts from Australia. This apparently was news to executives at his company and The Journal, who cautioned that the decision might not be final. Mr. Murdoch made his statements in an address to shareholders in the South Australian center of Adelaide on Tuesday — late Monday night in New York — and in an interview carried in the Tuesday issue of his national newspaper, The Australian. News agencies reported that he said of The Journal’s Web site, “We are studying it and we expect to make that free.”

The Journal, one of very few large newspapers to charge for access to most of its Web site, has one million paying online subscribers. The fees they pay have been widely reported at $50 million a year, but a Dow Jones executive has said the figure is closer to $70 million. Mr. Murdoch also said he intended to expand the size of the weekday Journal by 15 to 20 percent and to double the Saturday edition as he expands its coverage of national and international affairs.

Mr. Murdoch has repeatedly said he is inclined to make access to all or most of The Journal site free to draw many more readers and more ad revenue. He told Australian shareholders that he envisioned, “instead of having one million, having at least 10-15 million in every corner of the earth.” But Gary Ginsberg, executive vice president of the News Corporation for global marketing and corporate affairs, said in an e-mail message yesterday, “No final decision has been reached” on the subscription fees.

There are many pros and cons to this. I feel that the increased ad revenue from opening the site to all readers would outweigh the loss of subscription charges, but that strategy could carry risks. With the website being free, they run the risk alienating the audience through over saturation and as a result, a decline in audience response could be seen. As I learned in my audience research class, too much exposure or frequency could definitely be harmful.

This article can be found at, "Murdoch Said to Stress Free Access to Wall Street Journal's Web Site."