Who’s going to persuade all of the major publishers to get on board with a single payment system, though? The FT will want theirs and Murdoch will want his and GNM will want theirs…

As much as it would make financial sense to support a common payment platform (or indeed as many as can reasonably be supported), I have a feeling ego may scupper this one.

I have to say, though, Murdoch’s not the best person to be championing paywalls. While the arguments have plenty of merit in principle, the immediate reaction from most of the people I know (and indeed myself) was “well… good. reduces the chances of accidentally running into Murdoch’s content online. when does the rest of his empire get the same treatment?”. In fact, there’s only one organ I’d like to see implement a paywall quicker than Murdoch’s, and that’s the Daily Mail.

Rusbridger may be bullish, but if anybody’s going to scupper paywalls in the UK, it’ll be GNM, with their apparent “public service newspapers” commitment, rather than the BBC.

(Mind, I’ll happily pay for specialist coverage — subscriber to the Eye and the Economist over here).

I am hoping that paywalls won’t create a branch of elitism in journalism, where only a minority are informed, on issues that are mostly focused on their minority interests.