Blog Herald Column: Could Blogging Adopt A Paid Content Business Model?

A friend of mine, Sahar Sarid, posted an interesting assertion about the future of blog business models (Sahar has an elegant mind, and his new blog Conceptualist is sure to be a great read):

Newspapers – Free (or no business model) (pre 1704), Advertising (1704, The Boston News-Letter), Subscription (1893, Frank Munsey)
Radio – Free (or no business model), Advertising (1909, Charles Herrold)), Subscription (XM, Sirius)
Television – Free (or no business model), Advertising (1941), Subscription (Cable TV, HBO, DirecTV, Showtime)
Blogging – Free (or no business model), Advertising (Federated Media, Adsense), ……. ?It’s… inevitable.

Sahar’s historical analysis is certainly compelling. If other media ultimately adopted a paid content model, why not blogging? I agree that there is fairly strong case that some blogs may ultimately be able to adopt a paid model, but there is an equally strong case why most blogs will not.

Read the rest.