News site charges for free study that says people will not pay for online news

NewMediaAge thought it was pulling a fast one by offering a study that reads "Almost two-thirds of people are happy to pay for quality journalism but not online, according to a YouGov survey," for a fee behind a paywall, when the same study results are actually available online without charge.

Thus, NewMediaAge proved why paywalls don't work, even as it was using one: all you have to do is search around to get the same content for free.

And where you can get the study results summary is the very YouGov site that produced the study, here: media paywalls don't work.

 That reports:

A vast majority (83 percent) replied that they would refuse to pay, with only two percent of respondents willing to shell out for online content in the current format. Only four percent would pay for online even when the content in question was not available anywhere else.

NewMediaAge must think the online consumer is stupid.

The study claims:

The Daily Mail is read online at least once a week by 8 percent of respondents, with the Guardian and the Telegraph trailing with 7 percent and 6 percent respectively.
The Independent on Sunday is the Sunday paper least likely to be read online with 96% of respondents saying they do not read the paper online.
Restaurant reviews are more likely to be read by people in the ABC1 social grade than by their C2DE counterparts.
59 percent of the public agree that it is worth paying for a good newspaper.
39 percent agree that newspapers are too expensive now.
17 percent of the public believe that there is no point paying for a paper when you can get it for free. This statistic is the same across the ABC1 and the C2DE social grades.
1 in 5 men admit to watching 'adult content' online.

The idea that paywalls work for news sites is borne of the same arrogance that prevents traditional media sites from fully adopting new approaches to the delivery of news. The bottom line is that the emergence of the personal media network of cell phones, blogs, camcorders-in-PDAs, and so on, has rendered it impossible for Old Media organizations like The New York Times and The Associated Press to enjoy the revenue levels of the past.

Today, anyone can produce media and get paid for it by affiliate marketing or ad sales. The free access blogs win the battle, with their more nimble, and free, news production culture.

Paywalls don't stand a chance, and neither do the companies, like NewMediaAge, that have them.

Stay tuned.