Newspapers are in a bind. By posting content online, they are basically giving their content away for free. But if they charge for an online subscription, few people will sign up and their content will for all practical purposes disappear from the internet. Similar issues face online learning, where the content is something we really want to have a wider influence but which in a market where it competes with video games and online music is not likely to capture a significant consumer dollar. In both cases, the liklihood is that agencies with a political or social objective will pay for production costs, but at the cost of infusing the product with propaganda. This is why it is essential to have public broadcasting corporations, both of news and of learning. But this happens only when governments give up on the idea of creating commercial enterprises out of these, and there's no sign of this happening any time soon.
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