A Wall-less 'Wall' Street Journal Losing Online Revenue? Not A Chance.

The Wall Street Journal will lose $63 million in revenue if it made its advertising free.

That's what the media world is saying after Rupert Murdoch and Co. hinted that the last "Great Wall of Online Journalism" might soon fall, months after its closest competitor put the kibosh on TimesSelect.

But you know what? With all of the numbers floating 'round in that article, I really think this flap is misleading.

"Recovering that in advertising sales would require boosting traffic by 130 percent, based on calculations by Reuters and Mike Vorhaus, managing director of Frank N. Magid Associates and a veteran media industry consultant to Dow Jones, New York Times Co's namesake newspaper and Time Warner Inc's online unit AOL.

Few doubt Murdoch's logic, given that as much as 80 percent of financial Web site visitors leave after refusing to pay subscription fees, according to Vorhaus, and given the rapid growth of Internet advertising."

You know what, Rupe? I'm right there with you on this one. If the Journal brought down the wall, there would be an instant traffic boost (the difference between The New York Times and this one is that most of the Journal's content, and not just editorials, is behind the wall). I'm not going to lie -- I regularly read the daily free WSJ.com content and only if I have access, such as during a "free" day or through an institution, will read further. Why?

The 21st century's mantra online, that's why: If it causes me difficulty or expense to get, I don't want it -- especially if I can get it somewhere else.

Meanwhile, the whole nation is wondering what's going on and why they should care when the press screams out that FOX-bred Murdoch is buying the Journal. Why should they care? It's not like the occasional reader is going to pony up the dough for an annual WSJ subscription.

But if it's free, and it's online, they might just read it. And what WSJ-er wouldn't want their quality work to be seen?

It sounds like a management decision, but it's really an editorial win -- and don't let the numbers fool you, because it's not a big hit against the Journal to lose that kind of cash:

1. Because newspapers primarily rely on advertising and not subscriptions, even if they do bring extra cash flow;
   
2. Because while that figure is the top of the pops for online journalism, it's pebbles compared to the printed edition;
   
3. Because the Journal will see large traffic increases just by lowering the wall, thus increasing advertising rates; and
   
4. Because there's no reason why the Journal, in setting an online trend, can't raise it's online advertising rates and start changing the business model top-down for the whole industry.

It's still early in the online business model, isn't it? Whose to say advertisers aren't going to pay increased rates for a newly-free online Journal?

With such quality writing in that newspaper, the risk is lower than, arguably, any other publication to make this kind of jump. And if Murdoch's smart about it, he'll advertise that fact like it's the second coming of the Fox Business Channel.

Readers will return -- shouldn't the Journal be confident in that?

The Wall Street Journal. Neutrality. A Chance To Make Right.

Yesterday, Slate's Michelle Tai asked the question, "How do newspapers report on themselves?"

And I've got an answer: They don't. Rather, they shouldn't.

The paper in question is the famous Wall Street Journal, a rag so esteemed that you rarely see a journalist write about the Journal without preceding it with "venerable." Yet with a Murdoch-ian News Corp. positioned to eat up what is arguably the nation's most important paper, Tai wants to know how exactly the paper is supposed to report on itself, given that News Corp. has its hands in, well, everything. With that kind of potential disclosure, how's a paper like the Journal supposed to have any space for actual business news?

Tai correctly points out that the public's perception neutrality -- a sensitive word these days in the media world -- would be seriously compromised if the Journal reported on itself. As an "important paper," the Journal would certainly shun avoiding covering News Corp. altogether, because that would leave holes the size of, well, News Corp. in the paper.

OK, can't do that. How about finding our "most neutral" reporters? Besides serving as a backhanded diss to all the other reporters at the paper for being "less neutral," you still have a cynical public who won't believe it with the "staff writer" title behind it. So what's left?

Tai saves the very, very last paragraph of her excellent and brief overview of the situation to what I think is the answer: Hire an outsider. She writes:

Sometimes the answer is to hire an outsider. In 2003 the Seattle Times chose a freelance reporter, Bill Richards, to cover its ongoing dispute with the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. To ensure objective coverage, editors didn't tell the owner what Richards was working on. Richards and the paper also decided that an outside arbitrator would have the final word on any disagreements.

There you go. With all of those top-flight journalists out of a job these days anyway, I say it's high time to hire a bunch (with experience at liberal pubs and conservative pubs alike) to cover Rupie and his media Death Star.

I'm tired of hearing that newspapers aren't neutral, and reading those that don't try to be. I'm also tired about reading the old yellow journalism tactics of championing your own paper in editorial, e.g. "Post beats Daily News in circulation! Woo! Top story!" So in my opinion, the Wall Street Journal should have a third party -- the Society of Professional Journalists or some similar group -- to choose a small team strictly for the News Corp. beat. Pay them average pay, too -- no more than they would get in any other department at the paper. Make it transparent; tell us who they are on WSJ.com, where they come from, and how much they're making for all of this. Full biographies. The whole nine yards.

Does it raise the question that the WSJ's own reporters aren't neutral enough? Maybe. But I think doing this "out of principle" is a solid basis for supporting this suggestion.

Would it be expensive? You bet. But if the Wall Street Journal can't hack it when the paper itself is in the pages, don't expect any other lesser paper to do so. You can say what you want about it, but it's my opinion that this is the only way to do that elusive neutrality concept right.

It's time to set a good precedent in journalism for once.