A single UK national newspaper paywall? Doubly unlikely…

Occasionally paywall conversation suggest that newspapers might work together. It seems unlikely in the UK, given their very different business motivations and models, but we thought we would do an instant poll to get some initial reaction to the idea. Via Toluna, Newsline asked:

Currently some UK national daily and Sunday newspapers publish their articles for free on the internet. If all of the UK national daily and Sunday titles stopped free access and got together to put all of their content on one website where you had to pay for access, would you pay £10 a month for a log-in that allows you to access that site?

Of 1,000 respondents, within three hours, only 3.8% said yes. Interestingly, that was comprised of 6.3% of 16 to 34 year olds; 2.5% of 35 to 54 year olds; and 1.75% of 55 year olds and over.

Toluna also asked what respondents feel offers the best value for money out of the following:

• Paying £145.50 a year for your TV licence fee
• Paying £30 a month for an iPhone contract
• Paying £45 a month for a Sky TV subscription
• Paying £15 a month for broadband internet access
• Paying £70 a month for a gym membership
• Paying £1 a day for a national newspaper
• Paying £3 a day for a coffee from Starbucks

The results from the same 1,000 respondents indicated that 15.42% felt that paying £1 to buy a national newspaper each day was the best value for money. When we ran this among delegates at last week’s Future of National Newspaper event this rose – not unsurprisingly given the audience make-up – to 25%.