You click, you pay?

Microsoft's BCentral site has an interesting article for website operators dicussing how the online public will *supposedly* pay for cyber services. It'd be worth hearing what you guys think about this. Are you ready to pay for visiting more of your favourite sites?

Here's what it has to say...

Meanwhile, here's what we do know: In making the leap from free to fee, Web sites must offer something enough users have to have (not just "nice to have") and pretty much can't get anywhere else. They also must continue to plan for a majority of their revenues to come from advertising, ad slump or not. "There is going to be tremendous resistance to paying for anything," says David Card, vice president and senior analyst at Jupiter Media Metrix.

But consumers will break down and pay for something they badly want or need, Card and others say. Over time, the resistance to paying for Internet content is expected to erode. Eventually, a shift in Internet usage patterns — the kind that could come with the adoption of Web services, or if cheap, efficient high-speed broadband access ever becomes widespread — could conceivably "re-train" consumers and reset today's expectations toward paying for content, Card says.

Jupiter Media Metrix recently completed an extensive survey of what people will pay for online, and found that 70% of the 2,100 respondents say they can't imagine anyone paying for content — which generally means articles, tools, games, music, graphics, audio, video, and, yes, pornography.

However, the survey also found that 42% do expect to see price tags on future Internet content, which means that the perception of the "free Internet" is indeed dwindling. Here's a look at seven types of content that analysts such as Card and Lee Rainie, director of the Pew Center's Internet and American Life project, believe will inspire people to pay: