From ROGER EBERT: Re Wired.com's prediction that we will eventually pay for Internet content: the obvious solution would be a simple fee of a penny a page. The technology to do this has existed for years; it would be channeled through credit cards. For most users, such a charge might come to perhaps a dollar a day, and yet the revenue would add up quickly for websites. There would be two webs: FreeWeb and PennyWeb. The beauty of this model is that you would pay for what you actually wanted on a painless daily basis, instead of having to pay large sums for annual subscriptions. Even sites that can currently command premium fees, like Wall Street Journal, might find they would make more money if everyone could drop in for a ten-cent visit.
Once microtransactions become economically viable, this will be the way to go. There's nothing wrong with paying for content to ensure its profitability, and neither the New York Times nor TVTattle need give away quality work for free.
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