KayWeb Managing Director Haig Kayserian has questioned Fairfax Digital's Chief Operating Officer Nic Cola about the potential for his company joining News Limited in charging for online news in the future.
Rupert Murdoch of News Limited hinted a charge for conews content may not be far away. Kayserian criticised this in his blog, and at the CeBIT Web Forward Conference on Wednesday, he publicly questioned Cola to see if Fairfax will rule out a similar move. Cola's answer was a careful 'no', stating his company is "always looking at ways to monetise our websites".
Kayserian repeated the question in the presence of Google's Tony Keusgen, who said his company's web strategy is "open" and "putting the user first".
Kayserian said: "I feel Fairfax Digital have missed an awesome opportunity to provide a key differentiator to their competitors at News Limited."
He added: "Murdoch is using the example of The Wall Street Journal while Cola talked about the Financial Review - these are specialty publications, not what would be classified in the Fourth Estate as news. News is a public right and must be publicly accessible at no charge."
The CeBIT Web Forward Conference, which has two KayWeb delegates in attendance, continues Thursday.
Follow @HaigKayserian on Twitter for constant updates.
