• Bloomberg, Friday, July 10, 2009 12:10 AM

In a survey of print subscribers, The New York Times says it's considering a $5 monthly fee for access to its Web site, nytimes.com. The publisher then asks subscribers if they would be willing to pay a discounted fee of $2.50 a month for access to the site. The free site is currently the most visited among newspapers' sites.

Times Co. is contemplating additional sources of revenue as marketers slow ad spending on the Internet. Ad sales at the New York Times Co.'s other sites, including about.com and boston.com, fell 8% in first quarter of 2009, compared to an increase of 6.5% in 2008.

"The question here for consumers is the psychological barrier of now paying when you were getting it for free before," says Ken Doctor, an analyst at Outsell. The paper will lose some readers as a result and has to "evaluate what this will mean for [online] ad rates," he says.

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